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Copyright N ° 


COEJRIGHT DEPOSIT* ! 







/ 



THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 
ANISON NORTH 


‘For there are two sides to almost every story. 1 


THE FORGING 
OF THE PIKES 

A ROMANCE OF THE 
UPPER CANADIAN REBELLION OF 1837 

BY 

ANISON NORTH w 

AUTHOR OF “CARMICHAEL , ” ETC. 


NEW 



YORK 


GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 



COPYRIGHT, 1920, 

BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 






MAK i 7 1920 



PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 


•§)CI. A566094 



INTRODUCTION 


The Forging of the Pikes is a romance based on old 
political struggles in Upper Canada over eighty years 
ago. In the first part of the story an attempt has been made 
to give the viewpoint of the Reformers—' “the Rebels” — 
who precipitated The Rebellion in 1837; tbe latter part 
the attempt has been equally honest to give that of their 
opponents, the ‘‘Tories” — or loyalists — of the day. But 
when all has been said it will probably be the love-story of 
Alan and Barry that will attract the greater number of 
readers. 

In the construction of the story the author wishes to 
acknowledge with grateful thanks, not only the help given 
by a few “pioneers,” who still remember early days in “the 
bush,” but also that obtained from the following books: 
“The Rebellion in Upper Canada,” — Dent; “The Life of 
William Lyon Mackenzie,” — Lindsey; “The Family Com- 
pact,” — Wallace; “The Life of Sir John Beverley Robin- 
son,” — Robinson; “Landmarks of Toronto,” — Robertson; 
“Toronto of Old,” — Dr. Scadding; and Mrs. Jameson’s 
“Winter Studies and Summer Rambles,” from which has 
been taken the little Indian song, “O jib way Quaince.” 



CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 

I Alan’s “Journal” 

II A Visitor 22 

III A Gossip 27 

IV Our Wake-Robin 32 

V The Indians 41 

VI The Doings in the Mill 51 

VII The Sore Day 65 

VIII The House Building 73 

IX An Unexpected Encounter 84 

X To a Far Country 96 

XI An Exciting Night 108 

XII Fateful Words 120 

XIII An Autumn Afternoon 132 

XIV A Disappearance 14 1 

XV Preparations 149 

XVI The Pateran! 156 

XVII Toronto 164 

XVIII At St. James’ 172 

XIX The Way the Wind Blows 184 

XX A Disturbing Appearance 197 

XXI A Revelation 201 

XXII Selwyn 206 

XXIII The “ Patriotes” 208 

XXIV The Discovery 212 

XXV Montgomery’s 22 7 

vii 


viii CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

XXVI The Skirmish 237 

XXVII The Fugitives - 249 

XXVIII An Interlude - ... 261 

XXIX Big Bill’s Repentance 268 

XXX The Aetermath 285 

XXXI To-Morrow? 291 

XXXII A Blot on His Scutcheon 292 

XXXIII A Visitor in the Golden-Winged Woods . . 293 

XXXIV Startling Tidings 299 

XXXV The Journey 310 

XXXVI The Home Going 315 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 



































. 

«• 






■ 







THE FORGING OF THE 
PIKES 


CHAPTER I 
alan’s “journal” 

1 WAS awakened very early this morning by the hammer- 
ing of a woodpecker on the roof. There is a bit of tin 
up there, put on to stop a leak where the clap-boards meet 
the chimney, and the fellow seemed to have got his bill on 
that. Whether his keen ears had caught the grinding of a 
woodworm beneath the tin, or whether he was merely sharp- 
ening his jaw-bones for later action, I do not know, but he 
was making a most infernal rumpus. 

“Hi, my fine fellow !” I said, “what are you doing, wak- 
ing me up so early in the morning ?” 

And then I threw down the quilts and stretched a bit, 
and looked out of the window and was glad. I should have 
a while to lie abed and think, instead of jumping out and 
into my trousers before my eyes were opened, as usually 
happens when Dad calls up the ladder, “Ho there! Ho 
there, Alan ! Time to get up ! Ho there, Alan ! Ho there !” 
— It’s a song I know well. 

The sky was still gray, with just the least brightening 
over the Golden-Winged Woods, and the trees looked black 
enough there on top of the hill. Strange how different a 
landscape looks at different times of the day — and the Gol- 
den-Winged Woods surely looked novel enough to me at 
this time of it. 

So I lay there looking at the trees, and the slowly bright- 

ii 


12 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

ening sky, and the “hill-field” on this side of the woods, 
where I had been plowing, and was much obliged to Mr. 
Woodpecker for a minute or two. 

Then I began to wish that he’d put an end to his con* 
founded hullabaloo, because it began to interfere somewhat 
with my thinking processes. 

Of course, I wanted to think about Barry. 

Whoever would have thought it? — that I, the “hard nut” 
as Hank always called me after he fell in love with Dimple 
over at the Corners, should be moonshining night and day 
over a bit of — I was going to say “frills and feathers,” but 
that doesn’t describe Barry. She’s the only girl in these 
parts that doesn’t wear crinoline, or ringlets, and I'm sure 
she never gets her mother to pull her stays together, as 
young Heck told Hank that Dimple does. Somehow when 
you see Barry you think of just Barry. You don’t seem 
to notice her clothes much, and yet 

When she came to me in the Golden-Winged Woods yes- 
terday she had on some sort of straight thing that made 
her look more like an Indian girl (a very lovely Indian 
girl!) than ever. It was a sort of buckskin color, and was 
tied at the waist by a scarf of bright red. Her arms were 
bare almost to the top, and about her head she had wound 
some vines of the squawberry, beneath which her hair fell, 
loose, long and straight and black as a crow’s wing. 

Yesterday was Sunday, but it was all because of Barry 
and because of wanting to think about her, that I did not 
write in my journal last night. 

Of course, I was at the trysting place first, over there at 
the waterfall, and so I sat down to wait, mighty thankful 
that it was Sunday and no hurry over the hill-field. It was 
warm as June, the wild mint and rue by the edge of the 
water fairly seeming to shoot up with the urge of it, and 
the little fall seeming to murmur the sweetest music that 
ever it had sung to my ears. The birds, too, were all at it, 
singing with all their might, as why shouldn’t they in a 
world so green, and happy, and beautiful? Whitethroats 
were whistling, and orioles, and the golden-wings were call- 


ALAN’S “JOURNAL” 13 

in g everywhere their soft “Zee — zee — zee” ; in a thicket 
near-by a veery was jangling away its “Ta-weel, a-weel, a - 
weel, a-weel !” and somewhere a hermit thrush was trilling 
its chant that makes one think, somehow, of soul-things. 
As I sat there the rejoicings of them were mingled with the 
thoughts of Barry, and then, presently, my dreamings were 
arrested by one song that seemed different from the others. 
It was that of a white-throat, but clearer, and more in- 
sistent. 



— the notes were repeated over and over, at intervals of a 
moment or two, each time nearer, but as they approached 
a something peculiar struck me : My white-throat was com- 
ing, not from tree-top to tree-top, as is the wont of this 
bird, but closer to the ground, among the lower branches. 

I stood up to see, peering through the saplings, but my 
doing so seemed to frighten the noisy traveler. It stopped 
whistling. 

To start it again I imitated its song. Often I had com- 
pelled birds to reply to me, even come to me, in that way, 
but this time there was no response. 



— again and again I whistled the measure. Other white- 
throats caught up the notes and replied directly to them, 
but not my bird ; I should have recognized it at once. 

At last, giving up, I was about to sit down again when 
the song burst upon me close by, from the very heart of 
the saplings through which I had been peering. 



14 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

twice over in rapid succession and nearer to me by many 
rods than ever white-throat had come before. 

I started in surprise, and the next moment there was a 
ripple of Barry’s own laughter, and she herself came out, 
parting the branches and pressing them back with her 
strong bare arms. 

“Aha, you rascal!” I exclaimed. “Was it you?” And I 
swear that at that moment I could have caught her as she 
stood there framed in by the young green leaves, with her 
black eyes sparkling, and her two cheeks glowing red on 
her tanned face, and her even teeth shining white in the 
mischief of her laughing at me. I wanted to touch her 
smooth bronzed arms, and to press my face to hers as I 
often do to my mother’s. But there is a quality about 
Barry that will not let any man come too close. 

She stepped out from* the bushes, letting them fly to- 
gether behind her, and threw herself on the moss at my 
feet, tossing her bonnet, which she carried by the ribbons, 
as far as she could throw it. 

“I fooled you that time,” she said. 

“Ay, Barry,” I replied. “You fool me many a time,” but 
I doubt if she caught what I meant. How could she ? How 
could she know what a fool I have become all because of 
her? And yet may not such foolishness sometimes be the 
very wisdom of a man? 

My eyes might have told her had she looked into them 
at that moment; but she did not, but sat poking a little 
stick into the moss, with her back turned partly towards 
me, so that I caught only the round of her shoulder and the 
profile of her face. What a spirit of the woods she seemed, 
there by the waterfall, with her black hair all bound with 
the green squawberry and her red scarf gleaming ! I tried 
to imagine her in Dimple’s outfit, a pink-flowered skirt with 
a big crinoline spread over the bank so that it covered all 
the moss, a big poked bonnet on her head with pink rib- 
bons behind, and two long curls hanging down each side 
of her face, maybe two long black lace half gloves on her 
hands ; but the very thought of it made me laugh out. 


ALAN’S “JOURNAL” 15 

“What are you laughing at?” she asked, throwing down 
the stick, and so I told her. 

She laughed, too, ^nd then, drawing her knees up she 
bound her arms about them and looked straight at me. 
(Ye gods, how I wish I could keep every look and gesture 
of her !) 

“But Dimple is very sweet,” she said. 

“I know it,” said I, a bit abashed. “See here, Barry, you 
don’t think I’d be such a scoundrel as to laugh at a girl, 
do you? I was laughing at the idea of you like that. It 
wouldn’t be you at all. I have no doubt it suits Dimple’s 
pink-and-white prettiness very well. Indeed she always 
reminds me of the very fine flowered china-lady, with the 
very blue eyes, on our mantel. I know Hank thinks she — 
Dimple, I mean — the most beautiful creature in all the 
world. But I — I like you best, and just as you are now, — 
Pocahontas.” 

“ ‘Pocahontas/ ” she repeated, smiling. “You often call 
me that.” 

She dropped her eyes from mine, and stared at the green 
moss, but I knew she was not seeing it, and in the silence 
I became conscious again of the plashing of the waterfall 
and the singing of the birds. What a lucky dog I was, to 
have all that feast for eyes and ears, there in the Golden- 
Winged Woods ! 

In a few moments she looked back at me. “Alan,” she 
said, “do you think anyone can be two people ?” 

“Two people?” 

“Yes; one person one day and another the next.” 

“Why, I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve never thought about 
it. Judging from the people hereabouts I should say, no.” 

She smiled again, but it wasn’t her merry smile. It had a 
sort of wistfulness or puzzledness or something in it. 

“But, you must remember, it is very hard for us to know 
some of the people we meet even every day,” she said. 
“Alan, somehow, I think things are rather — difficult — for 
people who are not always one person.” 


1 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


“It must be,” I agreed, but I swear I understood little 
of what she was talking about. 

“You think you know me, Alan,” she went on, “but some- 
times, I know, Fm an odd mixture. You think I am all 
of the woods. And so I am, usually. I love the trees,” and 
here she looked up and up through the leaves until the ra- 
diance of them shone in her eyes, “I love them and feel 
them right in my heart. And sometimes I am just the wild 
Indian you think I am, and the smoke of a woods’ fire goes 
into my head like wine, and I hold up my arms to the Sun 
God, and sing because of the free, wild life. But again — 
Alan, do you know what I was doing just before I came 
here?” 

“What were you doing?” 

“Why, lying on my back in the hay-mow, imagining my- 
self just the sort of lady you have laughed at, only very 
much finer, a very fine lady indeed, in a great castle — 
'baronial castle’ I suppose — walking over velvet carpets and 
seeing myself everywhere in gold-framed mirrors. And 
how do you suppose I saw myself ?” 

“How did you see yourself ?” 

She sprang to her feet and began walking up and down, 
gesturing to help make the picture clear. 

“Why, not in this Indian fashion, but with a flowered 
gown like Dimple’s, only of silk — and oh, so wide! — and a 
lace fichu about my shoulders, and my hair up in puffs 
behind with jeweled combs, and ringlets each side of my 

face, and a fan of feathers, broad like this ” She 

paused for breath, and the old laugh came back. 

“I don’t think I should like you so well,” I said, ruefully, 
but she would have none of that. 

“Oh yes, you would,” she said. “Wouldn’t I still be 
Barry?” And forthwith went off into a long, long pictur- 
ing of England, until I could see the fine castles, and green 
fields with hedges all about, and the great parks and hunt- 
ing-grounds with fine ladies and gentlemen a-riding at full 
gallop. And I could not but look down at my thick boots 
and wish they were better for her sake, and that I could 


ALAN’S “ JOURNAL” 17 

ride abroad with her, with spurs and gayly-buttoned blue 
riding-coat, a fair Knight to take care of so fair a lady. 

But while I looked at her, too, I would not have her 
other than she was. 

“Barry,” I said, “we’re in the Golden-Winged Woods 
today, and I want you to be Pocahontas.” 

At that she threw her hair back and drew herself up with 
great dignity, but laughing the while. 

“No, no,” she said, “today you must let me be — oh, Lady 
Catherine de Vincent. Will that do?” 

And then, sitting down again upon the bank, and tear- 
ing a bit of the squawberry apart with her round little 
fingers, she went on, and I was glad to see that a more lov- 
ing look came into her eyes — or perhaps I only imagined 
it so because I would have it that way: “But there are 
greenwoods folk in England, too, Alan. They are the 
Romany folk, you know, and they live in the groves and 
on the commons, in great, covered vans. And if you go 
to them in the evening they will ask you to sit by their bon- 
fire, and if you cross their hands with silver they will tell 
your fortune. Oh, they’re a free folk, Alan, observant, al- 
most, as our Indians here! And they have two languages, 
of their own, one of speech and another of signs. Have 
you ever heard of the ‘pateran,’ Alan?” 

I had not, and said so. And so she set to breaking twigs 
and crossing them to form a little causeway into the woods. 

“It’s like this, Alan,” she said. “When one Romany 
wants another to follow the way 'he has gone, he makes a 
‘pateran,’ and so there is no need to question a gorgio along 
the way.” (How easily the odd words slipped from her 
lips !) 

And with that she became very merry. “So when you see 
my ‘pateran,’ ” she laughed, “you will know that I want you 
and you must come, the way it indicates, see?” — and she 
placed one twig at the end to point like an index finger, 
and I saw that it might easily show the way by which I 
could follow Barry and find her, were she not too far off. 


1 8 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

But where could that be? For would I not follow her to 
the ends of the earth? 

“Where did you find out all this about England, Barry ?” 
I asked, for it seemed to me that she had learned her story 
in much detail. And that gave her chance to tell about an 
old trunk of her mother’s, filled with books and pictures, 
which had been handed over to her, so that now the spare 
hours that used to be so tedious, were being filled very 
pleasantly. 

“I know something about all that,” I said, “for we have 
some books that tell about Britain on our bookshelves. We 
have ‘Pamela/ and Fanny Burney’s ‘Emma,’ and Miss 
Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice,’ which my mother likes very 
much ; and ‘The Scottish Chiefs’ and ‘Days of Bruce,’ which 
I like very much better; and the diary of Samuel Pepys, 
which I like best of all. I should have thought of lending 
you these, Barry.” 

“Ye — es,” she said, almost doubtfully (I wonder why). 
“But you haven’t ‘La Mode,’ ” she went on, gleefully, “and 
oh, they’re so funny ! They’re all old, the ones I have, with 
such queer old pictures, gentlemen bowing, with their hands 
on their hearts, and ladies with awful headdresses and long 
stomachers and huge ruffs! I wonder what ‘La Mode’ is 
like now.” 

“Probably like Dimple,” I said, to which she gave very 
ready assent, and with that, absent-mindedly, she began 
to brush away the pateran, but I laid my hand on hers and 
checked her. 

“Leave it,” I said, “until you make a fresh one in this 
place (for I wanted to come and look at it when she was 
not there). But wherever you leave it I will follow, and if 
I do not come you will know that I did not pass that way. 
. . . Another thing,” I added, “when you whistle the bird- 
song as you did this afternoon, I will answer. They will 
be our signs — the white-throat call and the pateran.” 

The woods were glooming when I took Barry home, and 
on the way out to the road we saw no one, nor heard sound 


ALAN’S “JOURNAL” 


i9 

of any voice, but only the “ta-weel, aweel , aweel, aweeV’ of 
the veeries in the thick cedar bushes, and the swooping of 
a nighthawk’s wings, and the soft complaining of a whip- 
poorwill somewhere in the distance. 

But as we came from the woods we met Mistress Jones, 
who bade us a polite “Good-evening,” and, a little farther 
on, old Meg. She was coming from the tavern and was in 
rare good humor. 

“Well, well,” she chuckled, “I was young once myself, 
and I’m young enough yet to love to see a lad and a lass. 
Folks laugh at old Meg, but if ever she can do either of 
ye a good turn she’ll do it. Neither of you has ever laughed 
at old Meg. No, no. And she never forgets them that’s 
good to her ! Good-night, young lovers. Good-night, Bar- 
bara. Good-night, Alan!” calling the words back as she 
went down the road, rattling the end of her walking-stick 
against the stones, and leaving me, at least, feeling some- 
what foolish; for I felt it pity that such a one as old Meg 
should come into my sanctuary. But Barry only laughed. 

“Silly old woman !” she said. “But she has a very good 
heart.” 

• •••••• 

All this have I lived over again a hundred times this day, 
but most sweetly of all while lying in bed, after the wood- 
pecker’s alarum, looking out at the tops of the Golden- 
Winged Woods, where all this happened, and which I 
watched as the sky above turned from gray into silver, and 
from silver to rose-pink, and from rose-pink to golden as 
the sun crept up and shot its brightness over the tree-tops, 
beneath whose lightening shade the little pateran of twigs 
was even yet lying. 

Then came father’s “Ho, Alan! Ho there, Alan! Time 
to get up !” and up I got, reluctantly enough, I do confess. 

But when I went down the ladder and out into the crisp 
morning breeze, and washed myself at the basin on the 
maple block, I was glad once more, and threw back my 
shoulders, and inhaled my lungs full of the fragrant air, 
and was thankful to be alive. 


20 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


When I came in my mother had the breakfast almost 
ready, and was frying meat on coals drawn out on the stone 
hearth in front of the big fire-place. The smell of it was 
very good to me. And then I sat down, and, for the very 
first time, looked all about the house and thought what a 
very good place is a home. 

There was the table, covered with one of my mother's 
white cloths brought all the way from Dublin, for we never 
eat off bare boards as do some of our neighbors. And then 
I looked at the window, with its bit of white curtain knitted 
by my mother’s own hands, and its fern growing in a 
hollow-log pot ; and at the open cupboard near the fire with 
its rows of willow-pattern plates; and at the settle in the 
corner made by my father and myself, and covered with a 
blue-and-white quilt. Next my glance roved more lovingly 
at the bookshelves, where stand the books I had offered 
Barry. How well I know every one of them, and the 
others, too, — the poems of Burns and Wordsworth, Adam 
Smith’s “Wealth of Nations,” over which my father so often 
pores; “Lives” of Napoleon and Wellington in extra thick 
calf-skin covers ; Scott’s “Lady of the Lake,” and “Waver- 
ley”; White’s “Natural History of Selborne,” and, last but 
not least to me, a rare copy of hand-written notes on birds, 
copied from the works of Audubon and Wilson by my 
father’s cousin John, who knew both the birdmen well in- 
deed when he and they lived about Philadelphia. This 
seems to me a great library, for there are not many books 
hereabouts, but sometimes I fain would add to it, and will 
some day. 

Last of all I looked long at my mother, as she turned the 
meat in the pan, kneeling on one knee, with the fire-light 
on her face. Very dainty and pretty is my mother, with her 
fair skin and dark hair, and the gray eyes which, she tells 
me, are “Dublin Irish.” Always she wears a dark dress 
of blue over a crinoline, and a little white cap ; and always 
she speaks in a soft, low voice, different from that of many 
of the women in these parts. 

How strange that my mother should grow up in her 


ALAN’S “JOURNAL” 


21 


school in Dublin, and my father in his in Edinburgh, and 
that they should meet and come away out here to this new 
land, where schools are few and far between, and speech 
is sometimes uncouth, and manners rough! Yet, too, there 
are many who have brought with them the culture of the 
old countries, a leaven that may, in time, leaven the whole 
lump. 

After breakfast I went back to my job on the hill-field. 
But all day the happiness of yesterday and the mood of this 
morning have been with me. Up and down the furrows 
I have gone, feeling the labor no more than Buck and 
Bright themselves, not even thinking of it. After all, what 
is there better than to be young, and strong, and to have 
those we love near us ? 


CHAPTER II 


A VISITOR 


HIS evening, not long before suppertime, I finished the 



X hill-field, and was glad enough to be done with it, 
and to turn Buck and Bright out into the pasture for a 
long evening’s rest. Glad enough they were, too, and when 
I had let down the bars, lost no time in getting through, and 
so straight ahead, knee-deep in the grass and dandelions, 
flicking their tails and deigning never a glance to Blucher 
and me, — I putting the bars in, Blucher with tail wagging, 
ears alert and eyes now on me, now on the oxen. For he 
dearly loves to give them a run, the rascal, and only waits 
a word to be off making their hoofs fly ! Could he but ex- 
ercise his zeal with moderation I would fain give him a 
try often enough when they are plowing. 

As we turned to go to the house he began to yelp and 
made as though he would rush down to the road, and then 
I caught the sound of a horse approaching, and in a mo- 
ment, against the background of “bush” across the road, 
could see a solitary horseman coming at a canter. 

Evidently he was not one of the neighbors, for even at 
that distance I could have recognized any horse within ten 
miles or more. Moreover, there was something about the 
way he sat his saddle that proclaimed him no ordinary, 
untrained backwoods rider. It made me think of Napoleon’s 
wars, and cavalrymen as I picture they must ride. 

On reaching our lane, without a halt in his cantering he 
turned in, and so straight on to the door when he drew 
up with a shortness that I know would have sent me over 
the horse’s ears; and the next instant I saw my father 
come out in great haste, my mother following, the sun shin- 


22 


A VISITOR 


23 

ing on her white cap. Evidently the stranger was very wel- 
come, for they both went up close to the horse and appeared 
to be exchanging greetings. 

With that Blucher and I set off for the house at a brisk 
rate, and by the time we reached the yard gate I could see 
that the visitor, who had now dismounted and was stand- 
ing, hat in hand, wore clothes of no common homespun, 
but of fine material, the riding-coat dark with bright but- 
tons, the breeches gray, topped off with a yellowish waist- 
coat and black necktie. He was a man of perhaps sixty 
years of age or more, much older than the most of the men 
in these parts, and when he turned so that I could see his 
face it drew me mightily. He was talking and smiling, and 
there was that in his manner which bespoke him for a 
gentleman. The words that came to me, too, while the 
English of the schools such as my father and mother speak 
(and I too, usually, by their watching and the grace of 
God!!!) had a difference, almost imperceptible, as though, 
the speaker were not of this land, nor yet of the British 
Isles. 

While I was still wondering, my father turned to me, and 
very pleased and smiling he looked. “Come, Alan,” he 
said, “take the Colonel’s horse,” and then I was introduced 
and found that the stranger was none other than my father’s 
old friend, Colonel Anthony Van Egmond, of whom I have 
heard as long as I can remember. 

The three of them went into the house, and I went back 
towards the barn, leading the horse and pondering how 
strange a thing is this life. For here am I, my father’s 
son, spending my days here in the “bush,” plowing in the 
fields, and grubbing out stumps, and hauling in the grain, 
the greatest excitement here a bit of a wolf-chase ; whereas, 
at little more than my age my father was over there in 
Europe marching along with the troops to Waterloo ! How 
often I have heard him tell the story, and of how, after- 
wards, he fell in with this Colonel Van Egmond, who had 
been with Blucher in that same battle, and of how the two 
of them had rambled about on the Continent and in Eng- 


24 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

land, coming at last to this new world in the self-same ship. 

Perhaps it’s a tame life this, for a young man with red 
blood in his veins. And yet — yes, it surely must be worth 
while to be in a new world at the very beginning, almost, of 
its making. Though sometimes, I swear, I do become weary 
of the monotony and wish for great doings, aye and im- 
agine them too. But these things I keep to myself. 

Truly, what a guest of importance this is whom we have 
under our roof this night! 

When I came back to the house, after grooming and feed- 
ing the horse — and a very fine horse it is — my mother was 
hurrying to and fro, in and out from the milkhouse, carry- 
ing the best eatables we have, all flushed and fluttered, her 
pretty cheeks more pink than usual. 

There was a ham lying on the high bench beside the door, 
and a jug of cream and heaven knows what not. “Hurry, 
Alan,” she said, “and slice off some of that ham for me, 
nice, thin slices, you know. It’s the smoked one, the best 
I think. And do you imagine you could find me some fresh 
eggs? I declare, I used the last up for dinner! Do you 
think he’d like the raspberry jam best? Or the wild straw- 
berry? And what about the pie? There are some of dried 
pumpkin in the milkhouse, and some gooseberry jam tarts. 
Shall we have both?” Verily, I have not seen my mother 
so anxious over entertainment in a long time. 

But it was the feast of talk that she and I enjoyed most 
this evening. Colonel Van Egmond was in great conversa- 
tional mood. My father, quiet though he is, talks well 
when he is aroused to it, and this interesting visitor has set 
him going better than in a twelvemonth. 

While we sat at supper the two of them went over old 
times, recalling things to each other, and laughing over old 
memories, speaking of places overseas as familiarly as we 
hereabouts speak of the tavern and the blacksmith shop, 
and making me realize how very much there is in this big 
world to see. I wondered if I should ever see it. . . . And 
then, somehow, in the very midst of their talk, I drifted 
off to thinking of Barry, and the flowered silk gown she had 


A VISITOR 


*5 

pictured herself in, and could see her moving about in those 
towns and cities of which they had been speaking. 

This it was that brought my confusion. 

Suddenly turning to me, Colonel Van Egmond said, 
“Don’t you think so, Alan?” 

“Think what, sir?” I stumbled, the hot blood flying to 
my face, were it only because of my discourtesy, for then 
I realized that I had been looking straight at our visitor, but 
neither seeing him nor hearing him. It seemed to me, too, 
that he must discern that I had been thinking of Barry. 

“Aha, my lad!” he said, laughing, “wool-gathering ? Well, 
well, no harm done* I remember when such talk as we 
are having was enough to set myself dreaming. Alan, you 
don’t know how many times I’ve been a General, leading my 
men in the wildest charge that ever was made, and the 
most victorious! You’ll do worse than dream dreams, lad. 
After all, some man’s dream is the beginning of everything 
that is accomplished.” 

And then I breathed freely again, for I became assured 
that he was no mind-reader. 

When the dusk drew on my mother asked me to kindle 
a fire in the fire-place, for it had turned cool, and as we 
all sat before it the talk turned to more intimate things. 
The Colonel had just come from Toronto, and so he had 
much to tell, and my father much to ask about the doings 
at the Capital. 

There is much dining and merry-making there, it ap- 
pears, among the Family Compact folk, and much less at- 
tending to grievances than one might imagine after the 
agitations of the last year and more. But “Little Mac,” he 
says, is still on the rampage, more furious than ever since 
he is out of Parliament and Thomson in his place in the 
House. That there is more sense than madness in Mac- 
kenzie’s holdings forth and writings, however, he is quite 
willing to admit, and he has some idea that things may come 
to such a pass that the Government may be compelled to 
attend. For all too many are being set aside to make way 
for the favorites who cluster about the Executive like bees 


2 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


battening on a clover field, and after over a year’s trial it 
is now clear enough that the Lieutenant-Governor has gone 
hand in glove with the clique. Indeed this is not the first 
nor the tenth time that we have heard that this same Sir 
Francis Bond Head, who came to us as a tried Reformer, 
is but a false friend, and that less than ever, since his com- 
ing, is there consideration or justice for anyone outside of 
the Government circle, the chief concern of these people 
being to feather their own nests, as feather them they do 
right royally. 

Until late in the evening we sat, and the old grievances 
of the Clergy Reserves and distribution of the Crown lands 
and all the rest of it were threshed out once more, with many 
a new side-light that makes the whole thing look uglier than 
ever. 

At perhaps eleven of the clock my mother and I, deem- 
ing that the visitor might have communications of a private 
nature, took our leave for the night, and I came up the 
ladder reluctantly enough, for I do find this talk mightily 
interesting, albeit (or perhaps because of it, since I have 
some of the blood of the fighting Irish in my veins) it makes 
my blood boil to hear of this and that piece of injustice, all 
of which even as rehearsed in this night’s talk, is too long 
to write down here at this time. 

Besides, I sat up so late last night writing that I am 
powerful sleepy, and so I must to bed. I wonder what 
bug is in my brain that makes me so want to scribble and 
scribble here by candle light. It’s a confounded habit that 
makes me a sore sleepy-head of mornings. And yet, there 
it is. I do decide often that I will write no more, and then 
at it I go again with right good will. I suppose it’s be- 
cause, as Mickey Feeley says, “If ye’re wan way shure ye 
can’t be another.” 


CHAPTER III 


A GOSSIP 

I WONDER if the Lord has not a special pardon for men 
who throttle some women! 

When I came in to supper this evening whom should I 
find but Mistress Jones, seated in my mother’s best rocker, 
her cap-strings flying and her knitting going in perpetual 
motion, as though she were there for the night. 

And I swear she kept time to the knitting needles with 
the clack of her tongue. 

While there was such pleasant talk going on here last 
night, there were high doings, it appears, at the tavern. She 
was telling about it in such detail as she could muster, and 
for a while I listened interestedly enough, as I scrubbed 
my face and combed my hair just outside of the back door. 
(There’s a damnable weakness in men’s brains as well as 
women’s, I fear, that makes them turn an ear to catch a 
bit of gossip.) 

The customary rookery was in at the tavern, it seems, 
drinking and chatting, and by and by the chatting turned to 
arguing, in the proper fashion. But Colonel Van Egmond, 
it appears, had dropped a copy of The Constitution when 
he stopped for a moment in the afternoon, and that had 
set them going worse than usual. In the midst of it Big 
Bill came in, good humored enough to begin with but ugly 
enough when he got a few drinks in, and by midnight the 
whole upset ended in a fisticuff row. 

‘T was goin’ past about eleven o’clock,” said Mistress 
Jones, “on my way home from Elviry’s, where I’d been 
helpin’ through with the new baby, an’ it was bad enough 
then. I sneaked up quiet an’ peeked through the window, 

27 


28 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


an' there was Big Bill up layin’ down the law, an’ darin’ 
anyone who didn’t like Sir Francis Bond Head to come up 
an’ have it out with him. I knew there’d be trouble, soon, 
unless that old Nick Deveril stopped handin’ out the licker, 
but there he was swillin’ it out over the bar, jist as stupid 
an’ sleepy lookin’ as ever. Ye could hardly see the bar fer 
smoke, but I could see the place was packed with men, some 
o’ them shakin’ their fists an’ spittin’ an’ some o’ them jist 
leanin’. When I got up on my tiptoes I could see Jake 
Taylor lyin’ on the floor dead drunk. ‘Ye’re the first o’ them 
to topple’, sez I to myself, ‘but if I’m any judge ye’ll be 
tramped on a bit before some o’ these others keels over.’ 
Queer, isn’t it? how the drink does with men. Some gits 
jolly, an’ some it raises the devil in, an’ some jist topples. 
That’s my man, an’ I thank the Lord many a day that I’ve 
got jist a toppler.” 

Here she had to stop to take breath, but before you could 
say Jack Robinson she was at it again. 

“I’d a’ stayed longer,” she went on, “but I was scared, 
fer Dick saw a bear in the back slash the other day, an’ ye 
never can be sure when or where bears’ll stray. So I jist 
satisfied meself that Dan wasn’t there an’ off I went. I 
do say, Mary” (it always makes me wince to hear her call my 
mother “Mary”), “I do say that Nick Deveril’s the worst 
comer we’ve had in long enough, an’ I hope he’ll not keep 
the tavern long; but he will though, fer he’s jist makin’ 
money hand over fist. An’ him so dull an’ sleepy like, too ! 
They say when things gets too hot he jist gits out at the 
back door, an’ did last night, ner ever came in again until 
all was quiet and the most of ’em gone except them that 
was lyin’ snorin’ on the floor. Now, when Ned Daly was 
the keeper as soon as anyone got fightin’ mad he had to git 
out, an’ there was no more about it. That kept most o’ them 
quiet enough.” 

Here I looked through the doorway, and saw my mother 
standing at the end of the table, which she was setting for 
supper, looking at Mistress Jones very seriously. 

“They do say the carousings are worse there now,” she 


A GOSSIP 


29 


said, in her soft voice, beside which Mistress Jones’s is like 
the rasping of a buck-saw. ‘‘But tell me, what do Mr. 
Deveril’s wife and daughter do when such goings-on take 
place?” And with that she was voicing the very thought 
that was in my own heart. 

“Oh, they keep out of it,” said Mrs. Jones, “as they keep 
out o’ everything else. Fer my part I’ve no use fer that 
Deveril woman, an’ I believe sure enough she has a story 
behind her, as they say. Why else did she marry sich a 

slow one as Nick Deveril? As fer the girl ” Here she 

stopped and I hoped she would not begin again, lest I 
should bundle her bodily out of the house. 

“I have seen her once or twice,” said my mother. “She 
is very beautiful.” 

Mistress Jones gave her yarn a jerk so that the ball came 
rolling over the floor. “Oh, yes, in a wild Indian sort o’ 
way,” she agreed. “To my way o’ thinkin’ she can’t com- 
pare with Dimple over at the Corners. There’s modesty 
for you ! But that Barbara Deveril ! She’s a bold one, 
flyin’ around without stays ner crinoline, an’ her hair down 
her back, an’ her arms bare, an’ her bold, black eyes ” 

Here I strode in, and I fear made a great noise on the 
floor with my big boots. In front of her I stopped. 

“May I say for my mother and myself that we do not 
care to hear such talk,” I said, and with that my mother came 
and put her arm through mine. It was her assent to a 
reproof which her shyness and fear of offending had not 
let her put in words. 

But my Dame Jones was not abashed at all. 

“Why, good evenin’, Alan,” she said. “I fergot you’re 
tender in that spot. I heven’t seen ye since I met you an’ 
Barbara cornin’ out o’ the woods, Monday, hev’ I?” 

It was just here that I could have throttled her with 
a good conscience, and would have, had she been a man, 
for the blood was tearing to my brain, I think, and I could 
scarce see straight for anger. 

“Will you be kind enough to go home?” however, was 


30 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

all that I could find voice to say, and that thickly enough 
in all conscience, for my very teeth were clenched. 

With that my mother pressed my arm, and I saw I was 
giving her distress. 

“Oh Alan!” she said. “Please don’t mind, Mistross 
Jones. Alan — is — is ” 

But Mistress Jones only laughed, quite pleasantly. “Oh, 
he don’t bother me,” she said. “I’ve come fer tea, Mary, 
an’ I’m goin’ to stay. Why he needs to get mad because I 
met him an’ Barbara cornin’ out of the bush I can’t see.” 

With that I took a look at her, and the Lord knows 
I couldn’t know what she meant, for she sat there rocking 
and smiling as cheerfully as though I had said “It’s a fine 
day, Mrs. Jones.” 

“Tell your father to come to supper,” said my mother, 
and with that I strode out again, making the rafters shake, 
I fear, with my going. And all the time, at supper, I was 
forced to sit opposite that woman ! 

But I did not speak a word, for the thing that was 
gnawing the heart out of me was that of my very anger 
I had, perhaps, reflected upon Barry. For why should it 
be anything but natural for me to go anywhere with Barry, 
even to the Golden-Winged Woods if it so pleased us? 

For the first time, too, I was defining the reason for our 
meetings in secret, and my strong aversion to speaking of 
my girl, or letting anyone know about our companioning. 
I had never questioned it before. The beautiful thing be- 
tween us was too high and pure, I daresay, to occasion a 
thought of accounting for it, and it irritated me to think 
t . hat this gossip had made definition necessary, even to my- 
self. However that might be, I now knew that the sole 
reason at the root of our — of my — secrecy was the sense 
of the holiness of our friendship. I did not want pro- 
fane footfall in my sanctuary. 

But my mother?— Ah, that troubled me a little. Once 
or twice I had suggested that she ask Barry to visit us, 
but she had put me off. Then I had thought nothing of 
it. Now I wondered. Did my mother’s pride of family 


A GOSSIP 


3i 

hold back at the idea of inviting a tavern keeper’s daugh- 
ter into our home? Did she, too, shrink away Jrom a girl 
who refused to wear stays and crinoline? — But my mother 
is dear and wise, I reflected. When she knows Barry she 
will understand how fine and sweet she is. And then the 
very thought that she should be refused our house and such 
as this Mistress Jones admitted to it made me smile, but 
not any too sweetly, I do aver. 

Nevertheless, I do swear that I have spent a wretched 

evening, and that when I think of Mistress Jones 

But I am in too ill humor to write more, and so 


CHAPTER IV 


OUR WAKE-ROBIN 

W AS awakened this morning again by that infernal 
woodpecker on the roof, — still so angry with Mis- 
tress Jones that she popped into my. head as soon as my 
eyes were opened, so that I think her jangle must have 
been in my mind even when I slept. Was not in good 
enough humor to linger in bed, as I usually do when my 
thoughts are pleasant, and so I got up and went down, 
much to the surprise of my father, who is always up with 
the dawn. He says he can’t sleep, but of that one may 
have suspicion, since he goes to bed with the crows as 
well as gets up with them. 

Colonel Van Egmond had left him a small bundle of 
papers, The Constitution , The Toronto Patriot, The Cor- 
respondent and Advocate , and others, and so he was deep 
in them, trying to make the best of his time at odd mo- 
ments, of which the work at this time of year does not 
leave many. 

Outside, the morning proved very fine, not a cloud in the 
sky, and the birds singing in great tune; and scarcely had 
my washing been ended when my father came out too. 

“Fine day,” he said, standing in the doorway, but I do 
not think he was much bent on the weather. Between 
what he had been reading and what Colonel Van Egmond 
had told him he was all with the doings in Lower Canada 
and at the Capital, the people in Lower Canada being 
now most rebellious, although not very openly as yet, and 
the dissatisfaction with the Executive in this Province so 
great that some think like trouble may come to a head here. 
Of this did my father speak in his quick short way, 
32 


OUR WAKE-ROBIN 33 

and with more readiness than is usual in him. Sometimes 
I wish I were more like him, a man of few words, but 
I fear I am more like Uncle Joe, who has all the Irish 
looseness of tongue, for when I am not talking with my 
mouth it seems I must come up here and divulge myself 
on paper. 

My father had a copy of The Constitution in his hand, and 
tossed it to me, with the short laugh he gives when he is 
quietly amused. 

“Little Mac’s at it as usual,” he said, “hammer and 
tongs !” 

“It strikes me he’s somewhat like the boy who called 
'Wolf ! Wolf!’” I replied. 

He nodded, then stopped to fill his pipe and light it, 
removing it after a few draws to remark : 

“He might accomplish more if he barged less, — aye. 
And yet one never can tell. The Colonel tells me he gets 
a better hearing every day, and that the people everywhere 
are muttering to themselves and anxious to hear how 
things are going in Lower Canada.” 

This was very interesting to me, but I had to bide my 
time, until he smoked slowly for a moment or two, his 
eyes fixed on the woods beyond the barn. After which, 
removing the pipe, he knocked the contents out of it, 
though tobacco is dear enough in all conscience, and he 
loves it as the air he breathes. 

“People will stand just so much,” he resumed, “and by 
all accounts Sir Francis Head is naught but a nincompoop, 
and letting some of them make a fine catspaw of him! 
There’s just one thing that will save this country, Alan, 
and that is what Mackenzie is prating for, responsible 
government. You can’t trust men when you give them 
too much power. They’ll look to themselves, — aye.” 

“That’s a hard saying, father,” I said, teasing him, for I 
knew that my father was not hard but just. 

“Well, there’s Baldwin,” he said, and I was well an- 
swered. He did not need to explain to me what he meant. 

“And Van Egmond,” I added. 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


34 

To which he gave quick nod of assent. And I knew 
that he would say “aye” to many others. 

How familiar to me are all those names, Baldwin, and 
Bidwell, and Rolph, and Morrison — and Robinson, and 
Hagerman, and Strachan, whom some call the Pope of this 
Province. I wonder if, one day, I shall see the men them- 
selves, and hear them speak, and so judge for myself. For 
it sometimes seems to me that one must not take any man’s 
notion of another, even his father’s, but must have his 
own vision and form his own opinions. One thing I know, 
my father and my Uncle Joe disagree mightily on these 
questions, and on their holding of this man and that. And 
I do think that is why Uncle Joe so seldom comes to see 
us, much as he loves my mother. For he and my father 
cannot but come to a word-fight and then my mother is 
distressed. 

We might have gone on talking, but just then there 
came a hissing noise out of the door and I knew the 
porridge was boiling over on to the coals, and so rushed in. 

My mother was just coming down from upstairs, and so 
I helped her get the breakfast ready, wondering why she 
should be so quiet. 

When my father had gone out to his work afterwards, 
she stopped me from following him. 

“Alan, dear,” she said, “sit down for a little, won’t 
you?” And so we sat down on the bench at the door, 
and I looked at her, thinking how pretty she was with the 
wind blowing the little curls about her face, and won- 
dering why her eyes should be troubled. 

“I didn’t want to bother you last night, Alan,” she went 
on, “but — but you know I’m — a little worried over you.” 

“Oh, it’s all because of that confounded Mistress Jones!” 
I exclaimed. “Well, what is it?” 

It seemed hard for her to proceed, but she did, presently. 

“You know, Alan,” she said, “that I have trusted you 
not to go to the tavern.” 

“And I have not gone,” I replied, my face growing hot. 
“You know that, mother.” 


OUR WAKE-ROBIN 


35 

She took my face between her hands and looked me 
squarely in the eyes. “I know it, Alan,” she said, then 
hesitated a little again. 

“I just go to the edge of the yard with Barry, when I 
take her home of an evening,” I added. “I have not been 
in the tavern in many a long month.” 

She plucked at her apron a little. 

“It’s — it’s just that, Alan,” she said, “I — I don’t know 
about this girl, Alan,” — And that made me sit up very 
straight. 

“Mother,” I said, “you know I have wanted you to meet 
Barry. I have wanted you to ask her here, so that you 
could know her for yourself.” 

That made the pink flush all over her face, but she was 
game, my little mother, and square, as she always is. 

“I know it,” she confessed, “and I am to blame. Alan, 
I’ve been afraid of her because of her — associations.” 

I could not but see her point there, for that the tavern 
has been a rough enough place — and worse since Nick 
Deveril got it — I well know. And so I could but repeat: 

“But you do not know Barry.” 

With that my mother sat very still for a long time, think- 
ing, then she turned to me with the smile that I love. 

“The other day,” she said, “down in the black muck 
by the creek, I picked up a white wake-robin. It had been 
trodden upon, and the mud had splashed on it. When I 
held it in the water the mud all ran off and my lily was 
pure and white as ever. The mud was not of it. — Alan, can’t 
you find time to go over and ask Barry to have supper 
with us this evening?” 

Find time? — I just caught her in my arms and squeezed 
her until she cried out. “I’ll go right away,” I said, and 
kissed her, and then she patted my cheek. “Ah, but ye’re 
the broth of a boy !” she said, dropping into the brogue in 
mischievious mood. 

I had to walk, because Hank borrowed Billy the other 
day, saddle and all, but off I set on foot, cutting across 
the corner field and making such speed that I was astride the 


36 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

log fence, getting over, before Blucher spied me, setting up 
a yelp to let me know he had been left behind. 

Let him come? Of course I would, for why shouldn't 
he be happy as well as I? And so I whistled, and sat on 
the top log to await him, watching him leap through the 
long grass like a greyhound until he came up, mouth open, 
red tongue hanging, and the eyes shining in his black and 
tan head with the joy of catching up with me. After a 
spring into my face, he was over the fence first, and so 
we went on into the woods road, I noticing the gold-green 
of the leaves because of the morning sun shining through 
them on this fine May morning, and he making excursions 
into the “bush" on either hand, following smells, apparent- 
ly, that do not exist for us coarser mortals. 

And, indeed, I do wish that I might not miss any smells 
in such place, for those that I catch are so good, and even 
this morning, with all my hurry, I would fain have stopped, 
to search once more for the sweet grass, which the Indians 
seem to find so easily whenever they want to make trinkets 
of it. It grows at one spot on this bush road, where the 
stream runs through the swale, and often enough have I 
tried to find it, especially on mornings such as this when 
the dew is on. “Follow your nose," say I, and I follow it, 
but behold when I come to the spot which, I think, is the 
place of the sweet grass, it is not there, but farther on, 
like a will-o'-the-wisp, and so I go right through the swale 
and to the border of the woods where there can be no 
sweet grass at all. 

There is a sort of spice-bush, too, in this swale, which 
one can find at any time, and which gives off a very pleas- 
ant pungency when rubbed in the hand. And there are 
tall brackens everywhere, which come up in little brown 
coils in the spring, but are now very lush and green, and 
odorous after a fashion of their own, especially when 
crushed as one walks through. 

All of this do I write because I would keep the whole 
of this day forever, forgetting no detail of it, its fair 


OUR WAKE-ROBIN 37 

sights and odors of springtime, my mother's dear yielding, 
my own happiness, — and Barry. 

And yet they say Cromwell had a wart on his nose. So 
had my day its wart, and all because of that scamp Blucher. 

When we reached the tavern it looked very quiet and 
peaceful, the big gray building harmonious enough against 
its background of woods, with its yard stretching to the 
road very clean and well kept. I turned in, mighty se- 
rious and dignified, as becomes a would-be suitor, but no 
sooner did Mister and Mistress Deveril appear, which they 
did at once, than Blucher began to bristle, growling and 
barking and running back and forth to bar my way to the 
house. I have seen him do that same before, at times 
unaccountably, and always when Indians or peddlers appear. 
Nor could I advance one yard until I had scolded him and 
made believe to drive him back with a stick, when he ran 
off yelping and then sat down on his haunches and barked 
defiance at me. 

Then when I went forward to enter whom should I meet 
but Old Meg coming out with a fine, strong flavor to her 
breath, and merry over my predicament. 

“There’s trouble ahead,” she said as she passed me, 
“when a dog bars the way. Watch out, Mister Alan,” — • 
and so she went on laughing and muttering. 

It was the first time I had had the chance of seeing Mis- 
tress Deveril at close range, and so I looked at her in- 
terestedly enough, — a sharp-looking, dark woman, but with- 
out a look of Barry that I could trace, nor a sign except, 
perhaps, in her manner of speaking. She looks bitter and 
restless, as one might imagine a caged animal, but I must 
say there is a presence about her, too, that justifies Mis- 
tress Jones’s remark about the wonder of her marrying 
Nick Deveril. 

“I daresay you want to see Barry,” she said. “She’s 
behind there,” nodding towards the interior, so in I went, 
and not knowing just how to summon her, after a moment 
whistled the white-throat’s song in the hall by the stairway. 

At once she answered in like fashion from above, then 


38 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

called over the banister, “In a moment, Alan,” and so 
left me to my own devices. 

A bit curiously I glanced into the bar, a quiet enough 
place so early in the morning, and then I turned into a 
room across from it, a sort of public room, very clean like 
all the rest of the place, with papers on the table and no 
end of Windsor chairs, of which we have one at home 
here, so that I know them. 

There was a little nosegay of spring flowers on the 
table, white and bluish flowers of the liverleaf which is al- 
most at its last for this year, and yellow adder’s tongue 
with its brown blotched leaves, and in this I saw the touch 
of Barry. 

Presently she came down, very demure in a dress of dark 
blue, her hair in thick braids about her head. 

“I’m afraid I’ve interrupted you at your work, Barry,” 
I said, for I know well how many tasks she has to do, 
“but I’ll not keep you long. My mother sent me to ask 
you to have supper with us.” 

Never before have I seen Barry blush, but with that she 
stood still and stared at me, in a startled sort of way, the 
red creeping slowly all over her face. 

“Your mother? — Me?” she faltered. 

“Yes, you — why not?” I stammered, confused with her.. 

But quickly she collected herself. “Why, of course,” 
she said. “How very kind of her. I’ll be there, Alan,” 
with the smile that sets her lips in the curve that I love. 

There was little more then. She fastened one of the 
little white blossoms in my coat. 

“Pure, like you, Barry,” I said, though the words were 
my mother’s rather than mine, for I was thinking of her 
white wake-robin. . . . Then presently I was off again back 
along the woods road, with Blucher slinking at my heels 
thoroughly ashamed of himself, for I had not deigned to 
give him a word of forgiveness. 

About three of the afternoon I saw her coming down the 
road slowly enough, though because of her pink dress and 


OUR WAKE-ROBIN 39 

a bit of a pink parasol I could not have guessed it was she 
save for the slimness of her skirts. That made me glad, 
for I liked to see Barry stand by her guns. Womenkind 
in general, I have noticed, seem to have no guns at all to 
stand by, but are blown about this way and that, as though 
the minds the Lord gave them were not to be used. Of 
this charge, however, I must acquit my mother, for mind 
enough of her own has she, though she uses it in so gentle 
a way that usually one is not conscious of it, but only 
afterwards comes to know that he has been doing her will. 

Until it was time to go in for supper I wondered much 
how she and Barry were getting along, but it must have 
been easily enough, since when at last I was free I found 
them both chatting merrily, and Barry helping to carry 
the things from the cupboard to the table. The pink dreks 
now proved to be a pink calico, and it pleased me to see 
that her hair was in thick braids about her head as in the 
morning, except that she had drawn it down at the sides 
more, to cover her ears. About her shoulders she had 
pinned a very soft white kerchief, and about her throat 
a very narrow bit of black ribbon from which hung a 
locket of dull gold. 

Would that I might write all of the things that she said 
all evening, as we sat on chairs in front of the door, while 
the sky deepened into red in the West and then faded so 
that the stars came out, a whippoorwill all the while sing- 
ing in the woods beyond the road. 

But it is late in the night, and so I will add only this: 
that as she talked, with her pretty soft voice that has an 
appealing sort of plaintiveness in it, making a new music 
in the place, my father as he sat smoking watched her with 
a pleased twinkle in his eyes; my mother, too, talking and 
laughing more than her wont. 

It was perhaps nine of the clock when our visitor said 
she must go home and donned her white bonnet, and put 
a thin shawl about her shoulders, and got her little pink 
parasol. 


40 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

My mother kissed her and asked her to come again, my 
father seconding the word, and so we set off under the stars 
over the road that got blacker where it lay between the 
trees. 

I was in mood to say little, and would have been con- 
tent with the touch of her arm, but she chattered all the 
way like a veritable magpie, so that it was easy to see she 
was well pleased with her day, and with my mother, whom 
she praised much. 

When I came back father had gone to bed, but mother 
was still up, stitching something by the candle light. But 
that was only a ruse, for when I came in she put it away. 
Then she came to me and put her arms about me. 

“Alan,” she said, “she is very sweet and good. She is 
my — our — wake-robin.” 


CHAPTER V 


THE INDIANS 

S UNDAY night again, and a very gentle rain pattering 
on the roof, which I do think is one of the most pleas- 
ant sounds in the universe. Moreover, it will make the 
young wheat grow, and the oats and peas, which are be- 
ginning to need it. Fairly can I see them sprouting up out 
there in the darkness, and almost I think I can hear the 
rain-drops gurgling through the soft earth to the roots. It’s 
a whim of my mother’s that all the growing things under- 
stand in some fashion of their own, and rejoice as they 
drink up the food that the rain brings to them. She thinks, 
too, that the flowers have souls, to which I tell her that they 
are souls, the souls of the plants. Sentient or not, it is 
true enough that the crops respond quickly to the caring 
hand, as every tiller of the soil well knows, and that they 
stunt and turn yellow at the roots for want of cultivation 
or rainfall. My father, remarking on this the other day, 
compared with them individuals and nations. Fed and 
encouraged in both body and mind the individual grows. 
Stinted in food for the body the body stunts, or in food 
for the mind and the mind stunts. So people, so nations, 
which are after all made up of the small units we call 
persons ; and so the Government that looks only to its own 
profit, forgetting that the people must have their fair share 
in everything, in the end must find its own ruin. For in 
and through the people must any system stand or fall. 

The rain began at about eight of the evening, and 
it is now well on to ten, so already great good will be done. 
All the rest of the day was fine, the trees waving with the 
kind of wind that comes before showers, the sky a very 

41 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


42 

light blue, with thin fleecy white clouds trailing over it, so 
it was little wonder that, having gone piously with father 
and mother to church in the morning, early in the after- 
noon I was enticed to the woods, intending to take a tramp 
therein and then be back to go with Hank and Dick Jones 
and some of the fellows from the Village to swim in the 
Deep Hole. 

At this time the whole woods is carpeted with flowers, 
brought on apace by the warmth of the last few weeks. 
Everywhere one looks beneath the trees is white with wake- 
robins — the white wood lily which my mother thinks is the 
finest flower to be found in this new land, even finer than 
the cowslips and daffodils of Britain. Beside a stump cov- 
ered with moss of a very bright emerald I found a clump 
of three of these lilies, each with a green band down the 
center of its three white petals — very rare in these woods, 
or anywhere so far as I know. There was also, near it, 
a great mass of Solomon’s Seal, with the greenish bells form- 
ing beneath, the stem, and promising so much gracefulness 
of beauty that I must return to see it within a short time. 
On pulling up one of the root-stalks and plucking out a 
stem, the little mark or coin-stamp from which the plant 
gets its name was very visible, as were also the scars of pre- 
vious years’ growths elsewhere along the root, -which was 
very thick and sturdy, so that one could well imagine 
Champlain’s starving garrison at Quebec, in those hazardous 
old days, glad to roam the forests for this plant. I have 
never cooked the root to test its palatability, but surely it 
would carry the romance of history and tang of the forest 
with it. 

Truly there is a rich harvest for the “quiet eye” these May 
days. But how can one stop to tell of all of the many 
species now in full bloom ? — the little white mitrewort with 
its flowers scattered like tiny snowflakes up the stalk; its 
cousin the foam-flower, very lovable; the white star-flower 
nestling on a mossy bed, with gold thread, much sought in 
these parts for babies’ mouths ; the bunch berry, promising 
a wealth of red fruit for jam-pots later in the season; white 


THE INDIANS 


43 

snake-root; blue cohosh, which some call “pappoose root;” 
Jack-in-the-pulpits, which should be named more appro- 
priately monk-in-a-cowl, shining glossy green and red brown 
in a forest of sturdy leaves ; windflower and red columbines 
in the open spaces ; and white, yellow and blue violets every- 
where. 

As I strode on, rich in the midst of all this wealth, the 
sudden call of a white-throat brought me to a standstill, for 
there was a peculiar timbre of Barry’s call in it, but mingled 
with a pathetic intonation that left me uncertain. 

Turning I walked towards the point from which the 
whistling had come, then stopped for further guidance. 

In a moment it came again, farther away. I followed, the 
whistling preceding me, again and again. Soon I recognized 
that it was going off in the direction of the waterfall, and 
knew then that the whistler was Barry. 

When at last I broke through the sapling thicket to the 
old spot she was there before me, sitting on the bank with 
her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands, looking 
out at me like a woods-sprite, with a smile half mischievous, 
half appealing. She had donned her buckskin-colored gown 
with the red sash, and her hair was loose as before. 

“Ah, it’s the wild Barry today,” I said, as I sat down 
beside her. 

“Yes, and I’m wild today all the way through,” she said, 
going away from me and seating herself, like a very naiad, 
on a boulder at the edge of the stream. “Alan, would your 
mother like the wild Barry — the one she did not see the 
other evening?” 

“Now that she knows you,” I said, “I am sure she would 
like you in any garb, and I am sure she is artist enough to 
appreciate you just as you are now, Barry, there with the 
waterfall behind you and the green above and about.” 

She smiled, a fleeting smile that passed almost ere it was 
formed. 

“Do you think she approves of me?” 

“Approves of you? She loves you, Barry. How could 
she help it?” 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


44 

But Barry recked little of my admiring words. She was 
looking off into the woods with the droop of wistful dis- 
content that sometimes comes over her face. 

“Because, you know,” she went on, “I don’t approve of 
myself.” 

“Hard to suit,” I reproved, smiling at her, then saw soon 
enough that she was in no mood for badinage. 

“Alan, I hate it all !” she said, turning to me, and I knew 
what she meant. “I hate it, Alan! I hate it!” — ending 
with a brave choking back. of a sob. 

I wanted to go to her, to catch her in my arms and tell 
her that she and I would fly from it — away and away where 
nothing could ever trouble more. But what could I, a lad 
not of age until next month and with nothing yet but a 
great determination, do at this time? And so I could only 
mutter : 

“I know, Barry. At the tavern, you mean.” 

“Things get worse and worse,” she said. “It’s all right 
in the day, but at night the men come in, and talk crops 
and pigs, and drink a bit. And presently it’s politics, and 
all Family Compact and Clergy Reserves and Crown Lands 
and what not, and fur begins to fly. And after a while, if 
they drink enough, it’s — beastly. I’m sick of it all ! Alan, 
do you wonder I go off into the hay-mow with the old 
novels about England — and read, and dream, and then 
dream again?” 

“But you will not always have to live in the tavern, 
Barry,” I said, and God knows I’d have given ten years of 
my life just then if I could have said what was in my heart. 
But I do think it is a mean and selfish cur who will try to 
tie a maiden to him in over-long waiting. 

“No?” she queried, smiling a trifle bitterly. “Alan, can 
one escape from these forests?” 

I looked about at the glory of the green, light-flooded 
leaves, with the great gray tree-trunks rising as in God’s 
own cathedral, and at the cool deep shadows, with the mil- 
lions and millions of wake-robins gleaming white as snow 
on the floor of the woods, far as eye could reach. 


THE INDIANS 


451 

“But it’s a grand, free life in this new land, Barry!” I 
exclaimed, my heart surging with the love of it ; whereupon 
she smiled again, and I felt at that moment as though she 
were years older than I. Indeed the thought was in her 
own mind, for when she answered she said : 

“Alan, I think I am hundreds and hundreds of years 
older than you. It seems to me boys are so enthusiastic 
and so — so short-seeing. Don’t you know, lad, that one’s 
mind may be irl prison even here ” 

“Or in a palace, Barry,” I interjected. 

She nodded, and went on, “But one’s Home means so 
much,” then caught herself up as though she had said too 
much. 

That word was almost my undoing, for it made my tongue 
run away with me. “Barry,” I said, “wait a little, just a 
little. Some day — and perhaps not so very far away — 
things will be right, for you, and for — me.” 

And then my speech froze, from the very boldness of 
me, and still more when she sprang up, with a ripple of a 
laugh, the wistfulness all gone from her face, herself but 
a saucy, merry, indifferent lass again, so that I could but 
marvel at the quickness of the change, and none too well 
pleased because of it. 

“Well, ‘care killed a cat,’ ” she said. “Let it go! — Do you 
know, Alan, some Indians are camped down near the ford. 
Really I whistled at you to ask you to come with me to 
visit them. Shall we?” 

To which I gave ready enough answer, and so off we set 
through the woods, she leading, as unerring as an Indian 
maid. Over logs and down hills we went, following the 
stream, until at last, rounding the Bald Rock, we were as- 
sailed by the barking of a dog, which stopped quickly 
enough when Barry whistled at it. 

“I knew these Indians away last winter, before we came 
here,” she explained, “and even the old dog remembered 
me. See, there’s Wabadick himself.” 

The Indian was sitting on a log smoking. He bade us 
good-day, scarcely turning to look at us, as is the way of 


4 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

these people. But Barry was in no wise abashed by his 
taciturnity. Even he gave way before her onslaught of talk 
and questioning, and soon we three were all conversing 
affably enough. His camp had come here because of the 
unusual quantities of black ash along the creek and in the 
swamps beyond. The black ash was best for basket-making. 
The inside bark of it was used, soaked and scraped and 
made very pliable for weaving. And the colors were all 
obtained from roots and berries, the red usually from a 
plant that bled, and that I easily identified a “blood-root. 
. . .” Yes, the squaws and he would make 1 lany baskets 
and take them to Toronto to sell them. There were many 
things to be bought in Toronto — blankets, and tinware, and 
guns; and if one took the baskets to the houses one could 
often trade them for very good clothes such as he wore. . . . 
All this was brought out by dint of questioning. 

As we talked little dusky children approached, then ran 
back laughing, then approached again, squatting down at 
discreet distance, like a covey of young partridges conceal- 
ing themselves among the leaves. But one tall, slim youth, 
perhaps sixteen years of age and more bold than the others, 
came near and sat down. He was very much a young buck, 
and I could see that Barry was amused, as was I, to behold 
how he had decorated the sober “clothes,” evidently recently 
procured in Toronto, with all the gaudiness he could con- 
trive. For about his calves he had bound leggings very 
much shagged with fringe and bound with garters of red 
beaded with all the colors of the rainbow; and about his 
neck was a bandanna of flaming orange ; while upon his felt 
hat was a gay border of red feathers of the little tanager, 
a full score of which, I doubt not, had been brought down 
by the unerring arrow to adorn this shy, yet gay young 
Beau Brummel of the forest. Never a glance to us vouch- 
safed he, but looked off as though his coming depended 
nothing at all upon our being there. 

Barry, however, hailed across to him, calling him “Joe” 
and addressing him in strange words that were unintelligible 
to my ears. To that he replied, and so they talked across one 


THE INDIANS 


47 

to the other, the short words hurtling like pebbles thrown 
to and fro. At last she vouchsafed to cast me a roguish 
glance. 

T did not know you could talk Indian, Barry ,” I said. 

“Oh, you don’t know plenty of things — about me,” she 
laughed, and indeed the words were true enough. 

Afterwards we went up to the camp, the little Indian chil- 
dren fluttering through the woods at either side of us, and 
safely ramparted by moss-grown logs. The camp was but 
a couple of wigwams, roughly enough put up in the usual 
way, of poles and birch bark, with some pieces of worn 
tarpaulin stretched about and held down by brush and sap- 
lings newly cut. Before the door the smoke arose from a 
smoldering fire, and near it the squaw sat, a little papoose 
beside her, securely strapped on its board but very placid 
and quiet. 

Barry did most of the talking, and it seemed as though 
the discontent of the earlier day had all been forgotten but 
that she paused once to turn to me and say, in a low 
voice : 

“One’s mind is not in prison here, Alan.” 

“Not today,” I acquiesced, to which she nodded smil- 
ingly. 

“Do you notice what they call me?” she went on, in the 
same low voice. 

“How can I,” I said, “since in Indian one word is the 
same to me as another.” 

“What do you call me, Joe?” she called to the Indian lad. 

He glanced at us to answer “ f Oogeneb'ahgooqnay/ ” then 
looked away off beyond the river. 

“ ‘Oogenebahgooquay’” she repeated, “The wild rose 
woman.’ Isn’t it pretty?” 

“It is pretty,” I said. “It just suits you, Barry.” 

“Does it? I’m glad of that,” she replied. “I don’t know 
much about poetry, Alan, but I think the Indian talk is 
filled with it. Their names for things make me feel often 
as x do— oh— when I look at the moon just rising over the 
Golden-Winged Woods, or see the sun shining through the 


48 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

ripples of the creek to the pebbly bottom, or hear the wind 
moaning through the pine trees. I can’t tell you, Alan; I 
can just feel, without a word to tell what I feel.” 

Which I partly understood. 

When at last we made way homewards, following nearly 
the way by which we had gone, the shadows were long, but 
they were very beautiful. 

Barry was more confiding than usual. 

“All my life,” she said, “I have loved to run off to talk 
with the Indians. That is how I have picked up so many 
of their words. Once, when I was a little girl, I went 
away with them when they were moving, and stayed three 
days,” — and she laughed with the memory of it. 

“How afraid your mother and father must have been !” 
I exclaimed. 

To which her brow puckered. “My mother? — yes, per- 
haps,” she assented, at which qualified agreement I could 
not but marvel. 

And thereupon the wistful mood of the earlier day came 
upon her again. 

“Let’s sit and rest for a while,” she begged, and there was 
weariness in the droop of her shoulders as she sank down 
upon a mossy place and drew her knees up, clasping her 
hands about them. Then she turned to me with eyes that 
looked far away. 

“I don’t know why it should be,” she said, “but a little 
Indian song has been humming through my mind all day. 
Would you like to hear it?” 

“I should indeed,” I replied, for I had never heard her 
sing. 

“Then sit across there,” she commanded, motioning 
towards a spot a little away from her. 

I obeyed, and she smiled, with a quick smile of approval. 

Then, swaying her body ever so little to and fro in time 
with the rhythm of the melody, she began to sing, in the 
sweetest, plaintivest, low voice that ever was heard, a 
cadence ful minor melody, so weird that it made one think 
of the soughing of the wind in the pine trees, and the moan- 


THE INDIANS 


49 

in g of it about the eaves on an eerie night in winter; and 
these were the words that she sang : 


OJIBWAY QUAINCE (CHIPPEWA GIRL). 



More there was in this wise. 

“But you do not applaud/’ she exclaimed, half playfully, 
as she concluded, “I have read that the hands flutter like 
leaves, in the great halls, clapping and clapping, when a 
great prima donna has ended her song.” 

“But we do not applaud, in the woods,” I rejoined. 

She gave a quick little gesture. 

“You are right; we do not applaud. Sometimes I think 
that the silence of these great wildernesses gets into our 
very souls, so that we only brood and brood, like the great 
trees.” 

“And then, your song was so sad. I know nothing of the 
words, but the air made me want to weep.” 

“It is called ‘The O jibway Quaince/ ” she explained, 
“which, you know, means ‘Chippewa Girl/ Hers is a weep- 
ful little story. It fits my mood today. It says: ‘Hah! 
What has happened to the young Longknife (American) ? 
He crosses the river with tears in his eyes. He sees the 
young Chippewa girl preparing to leave the place ; he sobs 
for his sweetheart because she is going away, but he will not 
sigh for her long; as soon as he is out of her sight he will 
forget her/ ” 


5 ° 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


“Where did you learn it, Barry ?” 

“Why from old Water-babbling-over-the-stones, long 
ago. It’s a story that is very often true, Alan. And some 
of the Indian girls are so very, very beautiful!” 

Much more in this wise did we talk, and then Barry 
sprang up with an attempt to be gay. 

“Come, Nichi,” she said, “If we do not hurry we’ll be 
meeting Old Meg again, and Mistress Jones will be warn- 
ing us that she’ll cast an evil eye upon us !” 

With that she laughed merrily, and the darkness was dis- 
pelled. . . . And so we reached the tavern, nor ever a sight 
of Mistress Jones nor Old Meg, for which I was truly 
thankful, for, as we neared the place, I was anxious enough. 

. . . Then on home here, and I swear I was quite at the 
gate before ever a thought of Hank and the rest of the fel- 
lows at the Deep Hole popped into my head. 

“I’ve been with Barry, mother,” I said, not waiting for a 
question, “over at the ford to see some Indians. They 
didn’t offer us any supper, and so I’m ravenous.” 

Closely as I watched her, as I made this explanation, I 
could see no wave of anxiety cross her dear face, but only 
a quiet smile. 

“I am sure you had a delightful day, Alan,” she said. 

At eleven of the clock here I sit. The story of the day 
was ended some ten minutes ago, and my candle is burn- 
ing low. Yet I have been seeing neither it nor the paper, for 
my mind has been all off a-wondering, — a-wondering over 
the mystery of Barry. 

Who is she ? How is it that she speaks as she does, and 
her mother, too, — the speech of my people and my father’s 
visitors and books, instead of the crude language of this 
bush country? How account for the tavern? And for old 
Deveril? And why did Barry speak as she did this after- 
noon, so doubtingly, of her mother’s affection? 

Verily all these things are beyond my probing. 


CHAPTER VI 


THE DOINGS IN THE MILL 

T HIS is Tuesday night, the end of a fine day with the 
hay almost ready for the cutting and strawberries 
ripening everywhere in the grass. We got the first of them 
on Sunday, Hank and I. But I am anticipating. 

That day, mother, father and I walked to church by the 
woods road, my mother very fine in her purple dress with 
white frills, very wide and outstanding, and her small green 
parasol. When we got to the Corners it was still early, 
and the usual crowd was gathered about the meeting-house 
door, chatting in the sunshine. We stood there too, and 
presently Hank’s father came over and spoke in a low tone 
to my father. Hank himself came to me and said, also in 
a low tone : 

“Do you know what’s up?” 

“No,” said I, “what is it?” 

But just then the bell began to clank (our meeting-house 
bell never “rings,” not even so much as my mother’s mold- 
board, with which she calls us to dinner), and so he had 
but time to say, “Tell you after church,” — which sent me in 
very much wondering. 

There was no great pleasure in the service, for the regu- 
lar minister was away, and our “local preacher” in the pul- 
pit, who did his best, with the sweat streaming down his 
face worse than mine does in a logging-time, with Buck and 
Bright at their devilishest. So I tried to shut my ears, and 
looked out of the window at the trees, and watched a blue- 
bottle fly on the window, and presently took to gaping about 
at the people, familiar as they are to me. 

5i 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


52 

There was Mistress Jones, sitting up very straight in 
what my mother calls her “black bombazine,” but “keeking” 
out furtively at us from behind the huge fan that she waved 
to and fro, so that the cock feathers on her bonnet were 
kept a-going making one think of a cock-fight. And there 
was Tom Thomson already peacefully sleeping, with his 
mouth open. And there was old Macaleer, fervently ejacu- 
lating “Praise the Lord !” whether it fitted or not, and much 
to the disgust of my father, who hates these Methodist ways, 
but since our church is a union meeting-house has to put 
up with them. . . . Then over the rows of bonnets and be- 
tween the dresses of homespun and calico, I could just see 
Dimple, very cool and charming in a white contraption 
with sprigs of blue, and blue cornflowers in her bonnet, — 
“alone like God,” as The Schoolmaster remarked very pro- 
fanely one day, because of the width of her crinoline, which 
will let no one within a yard of her on either side. Look- 
ing at her made me think of Barry. Only once did Barry 
come to this meeting-house, and then she was in duller garb 
than she usually wears, and I remember that when I re- 
marked on it she said, “But the other girls have to dress so 
plainly, Alan, all except Dimple.” 

Looking at Dimple made me also think of Hank, and I 
turned to see him in his corner, with his dear old tously 
fair head, which won’t stay smooth, leaned back against 
the wall. He was very careless of Dimple or anything else 
present just then, for he was gazing off out of a window, 
with the wrinkles between his eyes that always come there 
when he is thinking deeply. I wondered what was in his 
mind and in the mind of The Schoolmaster, who was sit- 
ting beside him writing in a small black book, and whether 
it referred to whatever was “up.” 

It seemed that the service would never end, for Mister 
Walters was improving his opportunity to take us from 
Genesis to Revelation; but at last the closing hymn was 
given out and the voices arose like a benediction, my father 
joining heartily, in his fine bass, because it was one of the 
psalms of his beloved Scotland: 


53 


THE [DOINGS IN THE MILL 

“I to the hills zvill lift mine eyes , 

From whence doth come mine aid.” 

There is always something simple and sincere in the sing- 
ing of our people that makes a fellow feel a bit solemn, and, 
I doubt not, in the music as much true worship as in the 
big cathedrals with their organs and what-not of which my 
mother sometimes tells. 

When the service was over I got out as soon as possible, 
mighty thankful to get a smell of the breeze again, and in a 
moment Hank came out with The Schoolmaster, who was 
mopping his forehead before putting on his “chimney-pot.” 

“Morning, Alan,” he said, cutting off his words even more 
than usual. “Managed to sit it out ? The whole Cosmos, by 
jinks! and not in a nutshell either. Well, morning!” And 
then, dropping his voice, “See you tomorrow night.” 

But before I had time to answer he was off, bustling about 
among the people, shaking a hand here, and taking off his 
hat there. Right next to the minister he is, in all these 
civilities. 

As we always do, Hank and I strolled off together, and 
Hank invited me to dinner, to which I gave very ready 
assent, for his home is an “unco” cheerful spot, with plenty 
of sunshine and laughing, and the children buzzing about 
like bees, so that it is no wonder it takes store and mill and 
all to keep them going. 

“Well, what’s up, Hank?” I asked, before we had gone 
many paces. “What’s all the mystery? What about to- 
morrow night?” 

“Why,” he replied, for my ear alone, “there’s to be a 
meeting tomorrow night, and William Lyon Mackenzie’s to 
be here.” 

“What !” It was little wonder I exclaimed, so unexpected 
was this news. 

“Yes, true as guns !”~he said, and I knew how much the 
event meant to him, “hot-blooded young Radical” as my 
father calls him — even more than to me, more given, as I 


54 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

am, to mooning about over flowers, and trees, and the good 
things of life. 

“Where is it to be ?” was my next question. 

“In the mill.” 

“The — mill?” 

“Yes, — don’t speak so loud. The Schoolmaster has ar- 
ranged it all, and it’s to be — sort o’ secret. You see there’d 
be danger of Big Bill and some of ’em coming to it and 
breaking it up if it was in a known place like the school 
or meeting-house. They say he’s broken loose again, and 
kicked up a fine row at the tavern last night. If he knew 
there was to be a meeting with Mackenzie at it he’d be sure 
to come half-drunk, with a riff-raff from beyond the Village 
at his heels — that’s his idea of fun. Then the fat would be 
in the fire.” 

“Are you sure it won’t leak out ?” I queried. 

“Not unless some fool is too long in the tongue. Only 
the Reformers have been told about it, and every mother’s 
son of ’em was warned to keep his mouth shut.” 

“In our old mill!” I exclaimed again. “If that doesn’t 
beat the Dutch! Why ’twas only the other day I was 
grumbling that nothing ever happens around here.” 

“There may be enough happening before long,” he said 
quickly. “We’ll go down there after dinner if you like. 
It’ll be a good way to get away from the fellows and have 
a talk.” 

“They’ll all be at the Deep Hole,” I remarked. 

He nodded, then pulled off his hat and rumpled his hair. 

“Yes. It’s pretty hot.” 

Hot enough it surely was, yet not even the too ardent 
rays of the sun could drive away the new spice of interest 
that had come into the day, and as Hank and I set out early 
in the afternoon it seemed that the very path along the 
stream looked important, and that the big clap-boarded 
mill, — prosy enough on a week-day with the mill-wheel 
creaking — had become a spot of romance. 

But on the way we could not but gather the wild straw- 
berries, at the part where the path leads through the mea- 


THE DOINGS IN THE MILL 


55 

dow, and so we arrived laden with them, which we ate as 
we lay on the big floor, chatting and listening to the rush- 
ing of the dam-falls and the gurgling of the water in the 
mill-race below us. 

“What time is the meeting to be ?” I asked, after we had 
discussed all its local possibilities. 

“It begins at ten o’clock,” he replied, “and the men are to 
straggle along separately, some through the woods, and 
others by the path, and others along the creek, so as not to 
attract attention. It’s pretty dark at ten, so there shouldn’t 
be much difflculy.” 

“I’ll meet you, then, at the flat rock,” I said. 

Hank was lying on his back, his hands behind his head, 
a bar of sunlight striking over his hair making it shine like 
gold. 

“Do you know,” he said, staring up at the ceiling, “I 
shouldn’t be surprised if this thing ends in bloodshed yet.” 

To which I laughed. “Have you been reading buccaneer- 
ing stories lately, Hank?” 

“No. I’m serious, Alan.” 

“Does your father think so? — about the bloodshed, I 
mean.” 

“No, he pooh-poohs the idea; but The Schoolmaster 
does.” 

“Oh, he’s a Radical,” I remarked. 

“Yes. There’s lots of Radicals now, Alan. They say 
up York and Simcoe way’s full of them.” 

“But one may be radical in politics without being on for 
letting blood over it,” I objected. 

Hank sat up, drawing his knees up and looking at me 
hopelessly. 

“I don’t believe you grasp the situation. There’s a lot of 
the canny Scot in you, Alan,” he said. 

“Maybe,” I assented, “and yet in most things I think 
I’ve my mother’s Irish in me. But the Scotch way of try- 
ing to see both sides, — why that I suppose I have. 

To which he was a bit testy. 


56 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“Look out for fear you sit down between two stools/ 1 
he said. 

“I don’t intend to sit down between two stools/’ I replied, 
“but I want to be sure of sitting on the right one. Now, 
my father is all the way Reformer, he’s as ‘agin’ ’ the pres- 
ent government as the next one, but he thinks political pres- 
sure will bring the needed reforms all right.” 

“Of course, after another hundred years or more,” agreed 
Hank, flicking a strawberry stem at me to show that his 
sarcasm was not unkindly meant. “And in the meantime 
the roads and settlements are kept back, and there’s no one 
gets a show at all unless he’s got influence. I tell you, Alan, 
it’s the people who are making this country, not those few 
muckamucks who are sitting in high places anH licking up 
all the cream there is. I tell you there’s no justice nor 
won’t be until they’ve been taught their lesson. Talk about 
Britons not being slaves ! If things go on much longer the 
way they have been, every one of us will be wearing shackles 
and feeling them too.” 

Hank was very much in earnest, but somehow I only 
wanted to laugh, and so I answered flippantly “Whoop- 
hurroo ! Mr. Stump-Speaker Hank ” 

Whereupon he stopped me with his hand on my mouth 
and set upon me so that in fun we wrestled and rolled about 
over the floor, quite forgetting our Sunday clothes. 

When at last we stopped, breathless, we thought of them 
quickly enough, for we were white with flour and dust. 

“Holy smoke!” exclaimed Hank, looking down at him- 
self, and then we set to at brushing ourselves and each other 
until our homespuns emerged again. 

After that we sat down, and Hank once more became 
very much in earnest. 

“Well you may laugh at me, Alan,” he said, staring out 
of the door, with the sunshine again on his hair, so that 
with the light of it and the flush on his cheeks he looked 
like one of his own small brothers and as little like a fierce 
rebel as one can well imagine. “But, Alan, the whole 
thing’s come very close to me somehow.” 


THE DOINGS IN THE MILL 57 

“I know,” I said. “You’re with The Schoolmaster so 
much.” 

He nodded. 

“And I guess it’s in me, too. I’d like some day to be — to 
be ” he paused a bit shamefacedly. 

“Oh, I know,” I said. “You’d like to be a Dr. John Rolph, 
or a Marshall Spring Bidwell, or somebody, speaking in 
the Assembly, and ” 

His eyes shone. “Giving them the devil!” he finished. 
“Knocking the very gizzard out of ’em when they try the 
bull-dozing business ! Alan, I’d rather be an orator stand- 
ing out for the people, than anything in this world.” 

“Go ahead, old chap,” I said. “You’re only twenty.” 

With that he turned on me. “Now, what do you want 
to be, Alan?” 

“What do I want to be?” I repeated. “I want to be a 
farmer, Hank. There’s no man in this country who is 
doing more for it than the farmers, the men who are cut- 
ting away the forest and making homes for the people — 
the people you spoke about a minute ago. But I want to be 
more than just a tiller of the soil. I want to be an all- 
round man besides — if I can manage it.” What I did not 
say was that in all this dream Barry was mingling, Barry 
with her smile, Barry with her sweet soft voice, Barry with 
her little independent ways and all the frank sincerity of 
her, — Barry, my “Ooogenebahgooquay,” my “Wild Rose 
Woman.” 

Hank smiled. 

“A farmer, eh? Well, that’s all right.” Then, coming 
back to his foolery, “You’ll make the country, I’ll keep the 
wolves from fleecing you while you’re doing it. Shake, old 
duffer.” 

And so we shook hands on it. 

But he could not keep away from the idea that had taken 
possession of him, insisting on it that dark days are before 
us in this Province. 

“It’s always been the way,” he argued, and as he talked 
it was not hard to see the orator that he might be. “Every 


158 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

onward movement has been stamped with a red seal, Alan, 
and it’s been the red seal of blood. . . Nothing short of 
that, he thought, could awaken those who are now sitting in 
the high places, — “Louis and Marie Antoinette,” he de- 
scribed them, “making merry at Versailles while the people 
cry for bread.” Hank, since his companioning with The 
Schoolmaster, has become enlightened about many things. 

It was because of all this that at a quarter of ten last 
night I went to meet him at the flat rock, finding him there 
before me, sitting like a black stump in the shadow. 

He sprang up instantly to meet me and we pushed 
through the bushes to the mill. It appeared all in darkness, 
for, as Hank explained, sacking had been hung over the 
windows. 

Taking a look in we saw, by the light of a single lantern 
on the desk, a few men already gathered, sitting about talk- 
ing, the shadows of them and of every outstanding thing 
in the place making long black streaks on the floor. Mac- 
kenzie had not yet arrived, and so we went out and for 
perhaps half an hour sat near among the cedar bushes, 
watching other black shadows slip out from the woods and 
disappear into the mill, and identifying the men, if the 
shadows defied us, by their voices as they exchanged “time 
o’ day” inside. Among the arrivals were my father and 
Hank’s. 

Mackenzie, Hank surmised, was perhaps resting a bit. 
Riding alone he had arrived at The Schoolmaster’s at eight 
o’clock or later, having ridden for hours without resting, 
and having eaten nothing since noon. He is a real patriot, 
Hank says, caring nothing at all for his own rest or com- 
fort, and burning up with zeal for the cause. 

At last a rather high-pitched voice that does not belong 
to these parts, could be heard behind the cedar bushes, and 
steps sounded on the pebbly path. The words were indis- 
tinguishable, but we both sprang to our feet. 

A moment later appeared the tall swinging form of The 
Schoolmaster, a shorter one, quite short indeed, at his 


THE DOINGS IN THE MILL 59 

side, — and so it^was in the train of William Lyon Mackenzie 
and The Schoolmaster that we entered the mill. 

Instantly the buzz of talk stopped and all eyes were fixed 
on the little figure that advanced with springing step beside 
The Schoolmaster. Straight forward to the desk the two 
went, then turned facing the crowd so that the light of the 
lantern fell directly on them. 

Mackenzie looked quickly over the men, as though esti- 
mating the numbers, and we saw him, a little fiery person- 
ality, with tense arresting face and piercing blue eyes — 
contrast enough to The Schoolmaster who stood beside him, 
tall and thin and pale, his long features more clear-cut still 
in the sharp light and shadow, with a wisp of his thick 
black hair hanging down to his eyes. 

For a few moments he talked incessantly, to The School- 
master and one or two others who went up to be intro- 
duced, turning from side to side, as he addressed one and 
another, and taking from his pocket papers which he placed 
on the table. 

Presently he sat down and it was time to begin. The 
Schoolmaster stood up and rapped on the table with his 
knuckles, so that the buzz of talk ceased and the men slid 
into the benches, Hank and I swinging ourselves up on top 
of a box at the back. 

After a few words of preface The Schoolmaster sat down 
again, and Mackenzie stood up, his high, thin voice cutting 
over the heads of the men, so that we could hear it quite 
distinctly. He spoke very tensely and eagerly, moving his 
hands in nervous gesture, and I would that I could here 
write down all the things that he said. 

Much of it was familiar to me because of my father’s 
talk, and The Schoolmaster’s, and from my companioning 
with Hank, who is eternally with The Schoolmaster and 
has all his arguments. 

To some of the men, however, much of the story was 
like one first-told, for it was the first time they had heard 
clearly and in sequence the things which they had so long 
caught but in snatches, and the intentness of their faces 


60 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

and rigidity of their bodies as they listened showed how 
keenly they followed. 

But it was when he spoke of the land grievances, which 
touch us most closely here in the bush, that the tension 
gave way like the bursting of a dam, and bodies swayed and 
fists were clenched and low mutterings came which broke 
forth here and there in groans and sharp outcries against 
the Councils which hold the reins of government of this 
Province in their hands. 

“Down with the Legislative Council !” roared a dozen 
voices, and then Red Jock sprang to his feet waving his 
arms and shouting: 

“Pit them oot ! Get rid o’ the hale squirmin’ nest o’ the 
Family Compact!” 

Even Hank sprang off the box, and I wondered what he 
was going to do, for his eyes were shining and his cheeks 
glowing, and his hair all rumpled with the running of his 
fingers through it, as he always does when he is excited. 

But Mackenzie himself held up his hand to beseech order 
and the turmoil stopped, and Hank got on the box again. 

Yet for all the evils Mackenzie spoke not once of the 
“fight” to which Hank seems to look forward. Pressure to 
secure a Parliament really responsible to the people was the 
strongest remedy he suggested. 

When he had finished, touching last upon the disaffection 
now seething in the Lower Province and lauding the “Pa- 
triots” who are there standing forth for the people, The 
Schoolmaster and others spoke briefly, but I did not hear 
a word they said, for I was looking at the fiery, restless little 
man, who was now sitting wiping the perspiration from his 
brow, and I was recollecting the many things we have 
heard of him. Almost I could see the wrecking of his print- 
ing press, about ten years ago, by nine young bloods of the 
town, who were afterwards treated as heroes in the place, 
and their fine of £600 collected by one Colonel FitzGibbon. 

Almost I could see, too, the scene of five years ago, when, 
at the election following Mackenzie’s first expulsion from 
Parliament, he was brought into the town in triumphant de- 


THE DOINGS IN THE MILL 


6 1 


fiance. My father happened to be in Toronto at the time, 
and saw the long procession of sleighs, all placarded with 
inscriptions proclaiming “The People’s Friend,” that 
brought him in, first to the polling-place, the Red Lion tav- 
ern, and then down Yonge Street to the Parliament Build- 
ings, with people cheering along the way and the little hero 
of the hour very proud and happy. 

Since then he has been again and again expelled on the 
charge of libel, but has been again and again upheld, being 
made Alderman in York, and then when the name of the 
place was changed, first Mayor of Toronto. Two years 
ago he was again nominated to Parliament, but was defeated, 
a man named Thomson taking his place. 

When all was over and we went out into the darkness, 
“Well,” I said, “blood isn’t spattering around on the pro- 
gramme yet, Hank.” 

To which the dear old bull-dog replied, 

“But the year’s not out yet.” 

On the way home I spoke to my father about Hank’s and 
The Schoolmaster’s notion. 

“It’ll hardly come to that,” he said. “It would be a fool 
business. The Government’s got the Militia, and the num- 
bers — the towns are pretty much Tory — and they’ve got the 
power to put the cramps on harder than ever, and would 
likely do so if a rebellion were attempted. But if it could 
be done, successfully, the whole outfit damn well deserve it. 
Aye.” 

Mackenzie, they say, left at daybreak the next morning, 
having important meetings to attend immediately. 

But now it is nigh twelve o’clock and I must go to bed. 

Poor old Hank! Wonder if he is sound asleep by this 
time and dreaming that he is “giving them the devil.” 

Continued on the night of June the 14th. 

Before I go to bed I think I will spend an hour in trying 
to write down the things I can remember of Mackenzie’s 
speech. 


62 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

He told first of the “persecution” of Robert Gourlay 
eighteen years ago, for daring to speak against the Gov- 
ernment. But the words of Gourlay are as true today, he 
said, as when he wrote them, namely that “Corruption has 
reached such a height in this Province that it is thought no 
other part of the British Empire witnesses the like, and it 
is vain to look for improvement until a radical change has 
been effected.” 

Still juries are packed, on occasion, as at the trial of 
Gourlay. Still men are intimidated to vote in a certain 
way (as we know of last year in the election which came 
on after Sir Francis Head had dissolved the Parliament, 
at which gangs of rowdies were sent to the polls, in some 
places, to bully the voters). And still bribery is resorted to 
to a degree that is shameful, both lands and privileges being 
given to hold to the Government those that can be bought 
that way. 

Particularly baneful are the land grievances, so much 
country having been given out in the Clergy Reserves, and 
permitted to the Canada Land Company and others for 
speculation, and granted to friends of the Family Compact, 
that there is no chance for this country to be settled as it 
should to make it a home for civilized people. Farms are 
far apart, and hence it is not possible to keep up the roads, 
which in winter usually become for weeks impassable, so 
that mails are stopped and there is very serious inconven- 
ience and suffering in case supplies run out or a doctor is 
needed. . . . All this we here know only too well, although 
we are better off in some respects than some of the settle- 
ments, for we have a schoolhouse and a church. At the 
same time it must be said, the schoolhouse is so far from 
most of the homes that the small children cannot go at all, 
and the older ones only irregularly and but for a short time 
in the summer. I myself would have suffered much from 
this had it not been for the persistence of father and mother, 
who, since my babyhood, have tried to teach me all the 
things that they themselves know. In many of the homes, 
however, the older folk are themselves uneducated, and 


THE DOINGS IN THE MILL 63 

own no books, so that, be they never so minded, they can in 
no wise teach their children, who are growing up in ig- 
norance. 

Of the burdensome taxation, too, Mackenzie spoke hotly, 
pointing to needless extravagances of the Government, who 
care for nobody’s fortunes so long as they can amass wealth 
for themselves. 

So far, he said, the methods taken to protest against all 
these things have been of little use. True, we have a House 
of Assembly, but, since the Bills passed there are thrown 
out as soon as they reach the Legislative Council, if the 
Powers see fit, it has never yet been able, even when it 
would have done so, to make itself an instrument of the 
people to ensure them good government. During the last 
eight years no fewer than three hundred and twenty-five 
Bills have been thus disposed of. 

Nor do petitions fare better. In Sir John Colborne’s 
time, when a deputation of nine hundred people called at 
Government House with a petition, Sir John dismissed the 
whole matter by saying, “Gentlemen, I have received the 
petition of the inhabitants.” Now there is no better wel- 
come. Sir Francis Bond Head — this man who was hailed 
as a “tried Reformer” — does not even appear with such 
courtesy, but continually flouts, even insults the deputations 
that come to him. And last year when the extreme step of 
stopping supplies was resorted to by the House of Assembly 
in order to force its will, he nullified the whole proceeding 
and defied the will of the people by refusing to sign his 
assent. 

That was in April. In May the “British Constitutional 
Society” was formed in Toronto to oppose all efforts of 
the people for a government more responsible to them, and 
shortly afterwards a certain Tory Colonel (no doubt, Colonel 
FitzGibbon) began to train a number of young men in 
rifle-practice. That looked as though a screw were being 
made ready to use, on the people, — if necessary. 

Then had come thi election, in which Bidwell, Perry, 
Lount and Mackenzie himself had been defeated, only 


64 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

Doctor John Rolph being left to look after the interests of 
the people and oppose the Family Compact. It had thus 
become clear that thenceforth it would be almost impossible 
for a Reformer to obtain justice, so that it was no wonder 
that many of them had moved away to the United States. 

In that election the towns were placarded with inscrip- 
tions "Down With Republicanism !” "Down With Democ- 
racy!” But it is a poor Government that howls "Down 
With Democracy !” in a country filled with people who work 
for their bread. That whole election had been a disgrace, 
with bribery and corruption worse than ever before seen 
in this Province. The Tories had gone in on the "Loyally” 
cry, with the Reformers branded everywhere as disloyal 
and ready to help in an invasion which was threatened 
from the United States. That invasion had never been 
thought of. It was nothing but a story trumped up for the 
election. 

After that he spoke briefly but bitterly of himself and his 
expulsions from Parliament because he had dared to be 
the people’s friend and expose the things that were being 
done, and towards the last he became very personal, lashing 
in especial the Lieutenant-Governor, the Chief Justice and 
the Attorney-General, and sparing not even the Archdeacon 
of the Church, whom he considers the evil genius of this 
Province, so far as its hindrance in getting a responsible 
government is concerned. All of which made me marvel 
that public men could so express themselves, even in a 
meeting as secret as this. 

• •••••• 

All this I have set down in my own way, and not at all 
as spoken by Mackenzie. Hank thinks he was quite wonder- 
ful ; but for my own part I may say that I have been swayed 
more, often and often, by The Schoolmaster, when he has 
been carried away by eloquence, in his own house ; and yet 
Mackenzie is not lacking in a sort of eloquence, and he has 
much knowledge of facts and conditions. 


CHAPTER VII 


THE SORE DAY 

I HAVE had a sore day. 

To begin with, it was hot enough to roast the devil, and 
I awoke in the morning with the air in my room so close 
that I could scarcely breathe. 

But there was no dawdling, for the hay was to be faced, 
and that in the worst end of the hay-field, in the part where 
the stumps are not yet cleared away, behind which we shot 
at the wolves last winter, so that at last they slunk off with- 
out more ado. 

Since the hay has been in cocks long enough it was now 
ready for hauling, so I lost no time in putting the yoke on 
Buck and Bright and fixing them to the wagon, after which 
my father and I rode to the field. I do wish we were rich 
enough to buy a mate for Billy, for this hauling of hay and 
grain with the oxen is a mighty slow job. In the meantime 
Billy, the lad, has altogether too fine a time, and grows 
sleeker every day, and almost too fat, so that I think I 
shall have to ride him more for exercise. This day, how- 
ever, he had run enough ! 

All morning we worked in the broiling sun, and were at 
it as soon as we could in the afternoon, for such sultry 
weather as this often brews a storm and the hay must be 
stacked. But at about three o’clock there came a break, for 
which that rascal Blucher well deserves a thrashing. And 
yet perhaps not altogether, for the oxen were in devil’s 
mood all day. The flies were at them, and it may be that 
made them more awake than usual and more anxious to 
lunge off from side to side whenever a clump of green 
grass was to be seen among the hay stubble. 

I was in no best humor, nor was my father, who said 
65 


66 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


little as he was building the loads, but mopped his face and 
got rid of his discomfort by an occasional growl at the 
weather — aye! Then, at about three, as I have said, the 
climax came. There is a wasp's nest in the end of a log 
where the raspberry bushes grow, which I have been intend- 
ing to set fire to, but have neglected, and nowhere would 
do Blucher but nosihg about in that part of the field. Twice 
or thrice I whistled him and he came back, but finally I for- 
got him and he got into the wasp's nest. 

With that he didn’t forget me, on my word, for he came 
to me on the mad run, making such a howling and hulla- 
baloo that the oxen were frightened and tossed up their 
heads as far as their yokes would allow, and switched their 
tails. After that the wasps must have got on them as they 
did on me, and my father too, for the next moment they 
were off across the field on the gallop, with Blucher at 
their heels, barking like mad — whether out of a sense of 
devilment or duty I do not know — and the wagon bumping 
over the hummocks, and lurching, and knocking into the 
stumps. 

After one glimpse of my father wildly waving the top of 
a haycock about his head to defend himself, I after the 
oxen, but all my running did not catch me up with them, 
nor yet did it rid me of the wasps, for they stung me on 
the neck and on the lip, so that it swelled up in fine style. 

At last at the pine stump fence the brutes came to a 
stop, with the wagon almost on its side over a log so that 
the tongue was broken and the irons twisted. 

This was a fix, with no time to waste, so I loosed the oxen, 
and my father came up and together we examined the dam- 
age. 

“There's no tying it up to 'do, Alan,” he said. “You’ll have 
to take the irons up to the blacksmith shop to have them 
straightened. I’ll get another tongue ready. Where’s 
Billy?” 

It took some time to free the irons, but Billy came quickly 
enough at my whistle, and so I on his back and off down 
the road on the gallop, hoping that, as I passed the tavern, 


THE SORE DAY 


H 

Barry would not be in sight, because of my lip. Indeed fof 
a minute I hesitated whether I should not go to the shop at 
the Comers instead, so as to go in the opposite direction, 
but that seemed too foolish, in the middle of haying-time, 
since the distance is so much farther. 

Good luck was with me, for when Billy and I passed at a 
canter there wasn’t the sign of a skirt; but evidently some 
travelers had arrived, for in the yard a man strange to me 
was rubbing down two of the finest riding horses that I have 
seen in long enough, so that had it not been for my lip I 
would have stopped to get a better look at them. Black, 
one of them was, black as midnight, and sorrel the other, 
very fine and slender, — with alert heads, and extra fine 
trappings, stamping and pawing as though they knew them- 
selves of fine horse clay. 

When I got to the blacksmith shop, which I love because 
it is altogether in the bush though at the side of the high 
road, Red Jock was standing in the door, with the sweat 
streaming down his- face, and no wonder, for the fire was 
going full blast in the forge. 

“Hallo, Alan,” he said, as I dismounted and tied Billy to 
the post, “what’s wrang wi’ yer lip ? Hae ye been in a scrap 
wi’ auld Deveril ?” — which from some men might have made 
me mad, for I might have connected it with Barry, but 
which I could take from Red Jock with good grace since I 
knew it was but a bit of pleasantry directed against the 
tavern-keeper, with whose meekness he has but little pa- 
tience. 

So I answered him civilly enough and soon had him 
laughing over our adventure with the wasps, and the vision 
of my father performing with the top of the haycock. 

“Sit doon i’ the door,” he said, when I had finished, “an' 
Ah’ 11 get ye a bit weed that’ll tak’ doon the s wellin’,” and 
so I sat down on the step while he went through the back 
door, returning presently with some leaves. 

“Here, clap that on’t,” he said, “while Ah luik at the 
aims. Fegs, but they got a fine twist ! It’ll tak’ a bit time tae 
get the kinks oot, Ah doot.” 


68 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

With that he took them into the shop and set to work 
with them, while I sat on the step between the two doors, 
holding the leaves to my lip, and glad enough of the draft 
which gave a little comfort, even though, from time to time, 
a hot blast came from the forge. 

“Did ye see onyane ye didna’ ken when ye passed the 
tavern ?” he called. 

“Two strange horses and someone grooming them/’ I 
answered. “I didn’t stop.” 

“Ye didna’ ?” with a twinkle in his eye. “Weel that’s odd ! 
What fer no?” 

Which I parried by saying, “Because I’m not so thirsty 
as you and Big Bill and some of ’em, I suppose.” 

“Nae doot, nae doot,” he assented, cheerfully, “but hae a 
care, Alan ! Gin ye couple me mair wi’ Big Bill Ah’ll — Ah’U 
tak’ the bit leaves awa’ frae ye an’ yell no be able tae drap 
in on the way back !” 

“Don’t!” I begged. “Say, they’re the right stuff, Jock; 
they’re taking the pain right out. But what about the 
strangers at the tavern. Did you see them?” 

“Aye, did Ah no !” with evident admiration, “an’ fixed a 
shoe on ane o’ the horses, the finest beast Ah’ve shod sin’ 
the Governor gaed through three years syne. But no a 
horse but for a gentleman — ower slim i’ the legs, an’ ower 
mettly i’ the brain, prancin’ aboot so that I’d a de’il o’ a 
kittle pittin’ the shoe.” 

Red Jock fixes folk first by the horses they ride, and af- 
terwards by themselves, so that one usually has to question 
him to get any satisfaction further than about the animals. 

“Who are they?” I asked. 

“ ‘Belzebub’ wis the black, ‘Bub’ fer short, an’ a richt gude 
handle, thinkin’ o’ the color an’ the fire in his een. Ah’ll be 
blowed, Alan, if the beast didna try tae paw me! But 
Ah’d nae grudge fer that. . . . The ither ane, they ca’d 
‘Fistiloferus,’ or summat. Noo I haud, Alan, that the 
name o’ a horse s’ud be short an’ shairp, sae the puir 
beastie’ll ken whan he’s ca’d, — ‘Pete,’ say, or ‘Andy/ But 
‘Fistiloferus’ !” in disgust. 


THE SORE DAY 69; 

“Was it Mephistopheles ?” I suggested. 

“Noo, Ah doot that wis juist it,” he assented. 

“But you haven’t told me about the men,” I urged. 

“The men? Oh, ane o’ them wis a great buck, gin Ah 
ken the breed, sae Ah thocht it maun be the Governor him- 
sel’ an’ saluted. Kind o’ haughty, ye ken, but laffin’ an’ 
vera gay, he wis. The ither, wha sat the sorrel, Ah doot 
wis a servin’ man. It wad be him ye saw i’ the yaird.” 

I tried not to be curious, but the arrival of strangers in 
these parts is an event, and so I asked, 

“Where are they going, Jock?” 

“Deil if Ah ken,” said Jock, “Ah didna’ speir. But Ah 
ken it’ll be yer nose oot o’ joint, Alan, — an’ nae harm in- 
tended — gin they hang aboot the tavern ower lang, for that 
ane is a gey fine gentleman.” 

In fun I threw a clod at Red Jock, but his chaffing did not 
alarm me, for what could a passing stranger mean to Barry? 

“Perhaps it was the Governor,” I hazarded. 

Jock did not think that. “He’s no Sir Francis,” he said. 
“He wadna’ daur gang aboot sae lanesome like wi’ the love 
that’s in the kintra fer him ! He’d fear he’d get a cloot on 
the heid some fine nicht. But ’twas a gey fine gentleman, 
some young buck wi’ siller, Ah doot, an’ a speerit o’ ad- 
venture. That Belzebub wad cost mair pouns, Ah doot, 
than any ten horses i’ these pairts — or twenty. ... Noo 
Ye’ll hae to haud your gab fer a while, Alan, or Ah’ll no 
hae the aims dune by sundoon.” 

With that he set to work, heating the irons and ham- 
mering, while I sat there, holding the weeds to my lip and 
changing them, the swelling going down all the while. 

When at last he had finished I judged it quite gone, and 
began to wonder whether I might look in at Barry. 

“How did you know about this weed, Jock?” I asked. 

“Frae yon Joe Wabadick, the Indian lad doon ayont the 
Ford,” he replied. “Thae Indians cam’ there frae the Re- 
serve a month or mair syne. He’s a braw smart laddie ! It 
wud be tellin’ mony o’ the lads aboot here summat gin they 
took a leaf oot o’ his buik — Present company excepted. 


7 o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

f Alan. Ah wis thinkin’ o ’ that rapscallion Dick Jones an’ 
thae fule laddies he gangs aboot wi\” 

“Well, poor old Dick isn’t so bad,” said I, “considering 
the chance he has.” 

“Noo ye’ve said it 1” he agreed, putting a few final thumps 
to the iron, “fer of a’ the clashin’ female bodies, yon mither 
o’ his ! Weel, laddie, gin ye wull tie yersel’ to a petticoat 
Ah’m no sorry it’s Barry ye’ve pickit on. She’s, the finest 
lassie i’ these pairts gin she is the dochter o’ yon sheep 
Deveril. Got some of her mither’s spunk, Ah doot. . . . 

\Noo, laddie, here’s yer bit aims, an’ aff wi’ ye.” 

He was slinging them together with a bit of rope and 
handed them up to me as I sat on the horse. “Billy’s luikin’ 
braw,” he remarked, patting his neck, then, leaning towards 
me and dropping his voice to a whisper, although there was 
no one about, nor a sound except from a katydid scraping 
in the grass at the side of the road and a chipmunk chat- 
tering in a big beech tree, “Hae ye heard aught o’ the 
meetin’ at Lloydtown?” 

“Nothing,” I replied, “except that Mackenzie left The 
Schoolmaster’s post haste to be there in time for it.” 

Jock stuck his hands in his pockets and paused to eject a 
quid of tobacco on the road, looking from right to left as 
though fearful of someone’s sudden appearing. “The news 
has come frae ane tae anither,” he said, “that there wis 
strong speakin’, an’ some talk o’ resortin’ tae airms gin all 
else fails.” 

Almost I started, for I had not taken Hank’s prophecies 
seriously. 

“My father thinks there will be no need of that,” I said. 

“Dis he the noo? Weel, ye’re faither’s ay a canny mon, 
Alan, an’ a richt sensible. But we’ll see, we’ll see.” 

He waved his hand and turned back to the shop, while 
I went on, wondering what ferment is getting into the brain 
of everyone of late. 

I did not intend to turn in at the tavern, but opposite it, 
my lip being now to itself again, I could not for the life of 
me pass by, the more so that the strange horses had disap- 


THE SORE DAY 


7i 

peared, and the yard was quite empty, basking in the sun. 

“Just for a minute,” thought I. “It’ll be neither here nor 
there with the hay,” and so I got off Billy and tied him to 
the post near the pump. 

There was no one in the hall, but there were voices in 
the room to the right, and so I tapped at the side of the 
door, and without more ado stepped in, when I swear I was 
never so abashed in my life, for there was Barry sitting at 
one side of the table, leaning her elbow on it and staring 
across at the “very fine gentleman,” evidently, who was 
talking to her. 

Before I had time to collect my wits and betake my way 
out, she gave me just a nod and turned back to him, her 
gaze fixed on him, and as unconscious of me as though I 
had not been there at all, which cut me to the quick. 

Just time had I to notice that he was the handsomest man 
I have ever seen, and perhaps thirty years of age, with a 
blue coat, all silver-buttoned, and gray riding-breeches, and 
yellow riding boots as bright as though just out of the 
shop, when my wits and my manners came to me and I 
took myself out of the house. But that was not the last, 
for when I was untying Billy the rope had become tightened 
so that it took some minutes to loose it, and before the 
job was ended I heard them coming from the hallway. 

For an instant they stood on the step and I heard Barry’s 
laugh, then her voice, to which he laughed, and glancing up 
I saw the two of them gazing into each other’s eyes and 
smiling. 

That made me bend over the knot again, and by the time 
I had it out there were footsteps coming over the gravel 
and the “fine gentleman” was beside me, with Barry still 
standing at the door. 

“My dear fellow!” said he, “Have you seen my man?” 

“I have seen no one,” I replied, bristling at being called 
“dear fellow,” and preparing to mount. 

The stranger, however, laid his hand on my shoulder, 
looking about the while as though searching for his “man.” 

“Heaven knows where he’s gone,” he said. “And my 


/ 


72 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

horses haven’t had half enough water. They were too hot 
to be given much.” Then, turning to me, “Will you be good 
enough to pump me a trough full ?” 

“When I have become your lackey, which I am not at 
present,” I said, hot to the crown of my head and flinging 
myself on Billy with all despatch, and giving him the touch 
of my heel that he well knows means top-speed. Nor did 
I look back nor slacken until home was reached, and I saw 
my father standing in the hay-field, with his rake in his 
hand, looking to the road at me and doubtless well pleased 
with my hurry to be back at the hay. 

This evening at dusk Dick Jones dropped in for a chat, 
but I was not in much mood for talk. However, he told 
me — and I have no doubt but that the news came straight 
enough, through Mistress Jones, — that the stranger’s name 
is Howard Selwyn and his man’s Matt Downs, and that 
the “fine gentleman” is about this country amusing himself, 
as Red Jock surmised. 

It is full two weeks since I last wrote in my journal, for 
it has been early to rise and late to bed because of the hurry 
of the work, but so upset was I this night that I was pos- 
sessed to write the restlessness off. 

I know I am one fool to care that Barry’s smile and look 
were all for that other one today, and yet I do fervently 
hope that he and his Beelzebub and Mephisto may be soon 
enough off to the regions to which they belong. 

Au revoir, Journal. May I be in better and more Chris- 
tian mood when next I come to you. 





CHAPTER VIII 

x THE HOUSE BUILDING 

T ODAY is Sunday again, and I have been wandering 
about all day not very well satisfied. Would have gone 
over to the tavern to take Barry for a walk, except that I 
am yet a bit stiff in the neck over her neglect of me, and in 
good twist to let my lady come around when she pleases. 
I fear, however, that that is but cutting off my nose to spite 
my face, for “I doot,” as Red Jock says, that I am the only 
one that is troubling at all about the matter. 

The event of the week has been that Jimmy Scott has had 
a house building. 

It’s queer how falling in love takes a man, if he can get on 
with it, — for what did Jimmy have to do when it caught 
him but get married, right in the middle of the haying, and 
without a decent roof to put over his bride at that. 

I met them when they were driving down the road to 
the Corners for the ceremony — him and Hannah, and no 
one else — in the wagon, sitting on a bunch of hay, with the 
oxen poking along as slow as molasses in January. But 
time didn’t exist for those two ! He had his arm about her, 
and was looking under the scoop of her bonnet, smiling all 
over his broad, red, good-natured face, and neither of them 
saw or heard me until I was alongside, much amused, and 
somewhat enlightened, to see that Jimmy was in his best 
homespun, with a wonderful plug hat that looked as if it 
had seen service before, and that Hannah was very re- 
splendent, but as never Solomon was in all his glory, in a 
bonnet which for size beats anything in these parts and is 
all loaded down fore and aft with pink ribbon. 

“Hold on there! Hold on there!” I called, just for fun; 
73 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


74 

and fun enough it was to see how they sprang apart, and 
how Hannah giggled and hung her head, so that I could not 
see even the tip of her nose. 

“Alan, ye beggar! Is’t you?” exclaimed Jimmy, — 
“Whoa, ye divils ! Where are ye goin’ ?” — pothering much 
with the oxen, to cover his confusion. 

“Where are you two going?” I returned, “in the very 
middle of the haying, too !” At which reproach Jimmy 
grinned broadly and looked two or three ways. 

“Goin’ to be married,” he explained, when he had col- 
lected himself. “The minister’s to be at the Corners to- 
day. “Yes,” looking off to the tree-tops with an air of 
unconcern, “Hannah an’ me jist thought we’d do it up and 
be done with it. The hay kin stand.” 

“Of course,” said I. “What’s hay to Hannah !” which set 
her giggling again, and dabbing her handkerchief into the 
depths of her bonnet. 

“Well, I’m sure I wish you both very much joy,” I went 
on, trying to recollect what was proper to say under such 
circumstances. “Let me see how pretty you look, Hannah. 
Turn around here !” 

“Yes, turn around, Hannah,” assisted Jim. “Let Alan 
see ye.” 

So with that she turned her face to me, and I saw her two 
cheeks, that are always red enough, redder than any apples 
that ever grew, which puzzled me somewhat, for Hannah 
is a saucy lass, and not given to blushing. 

“Why, you’re — blooming, Hannah,” I exclaimed. “Why 
those blushes?” 

But I was not long to be left in wonder, for Hannah is 
not chary with her chatter, and was just waiting for the 
preliminary modesties to be over to get in her word. 

“It’s only mulleins,” she said. 

“Mulleins?” 

“Yes. I rubbed the leaves on an’ I guess I put ’em on 
too hard, fer good Lord but my cheeks is stingin’ yet! 
They stung so back there that I asked Jim to blow them.” 

I burst out laughing. 


THE HOUSE BUILDING 


75 , 


“And did he?” I asked. 

“Why he did, until — until ” 

“Shut up, Hannah !” commanded Jim, and so Hannah did, 
by going off into another spasm of the giggles. 

“Well, Hannah,” I laughed, “you shouldn’t tempt a fel- 
low like that, you know, especially when you look so fine.” 

“That’s it,” chimed Jim, ecstatically, giving his trousers 
a thwack for emphasis. “Isn’t she a bird o’ Paradise, 
though! Isn’t she a snorter! Made it all herself, too, 
bonnet an’ all! Oh, I guess Jim Scott knows what he’s 
doin’ ! No dependin’ on mammy when it comes to Hannah !” 

“You are a lucky dog, Jim,” I said. “It isn’t every fel- 
low that finds just the girl for him, and gets her, too. 
Stand up, Hannah, and let me see the whole outfit.” 

“Yes, stand up, Hannah,” seconded Jim again. “Whoa, 
ye divils ! Don’t upset her. Never mind that grass! Ye’ve 
had yer dinner!” 

With a laugh Hannah stood up and gave me a saucy 
curtsey, and Jimmy and I gazed at her, I fear with vary- 
ing emotions. Hannah is pretty enough, in her way, though 
a bit too buxom for beauty; she has merry blue eyes, and 
just a few freckles on her nose ; but she has not, somehow, 
what Barry calls “the gift of clothes.” I fear I get into 
deep water when it comes to describing ladies’ dresses, but 
as far as I could make out this one was a very gay purple, 
with green frills on it, over a crinoline so wide that when 
she stood up it quite obliterated Jimmy. 

“I done it all in a week,” she explained, “an’ there’s 
forty yards o’ ruchin’, too. Lord, it took a lot o’ work! 
Aunt got the stuff at Laurie’s in Toronto, when she was up 
ten days ago, an’ didn’t I hev’ to hurry ! Jim wouldn’t wait 
a week longer. He’s the hurryin’est man I ever seen. 
There, look at ’im now, — tryin’ to put the sun on !” 

Jim had taken out his big silver watch, and was begin- 
ning to look restless. 

“Jim’s all right,” I said, “but the oxen are altogether too 
slow for a wedding. He should have got our Billy and put 
you up behind, Hannah.” 


76 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“Now, that’s talkin’!” he agreed, enthusiastically. “I 
thought o’ that, Alan, but I couldn’t think nohow what 
could be done with them hoops o’ hers on horseback, so I 
calculated it ’ud be as safe all round to keep to the oxen. 
Well, we must be goin’, Hannah. The Minister’ll be wait- 
in’. G’wan, Spot! G’wan, Star! Well, a good-day, Alan.” 

After much thumping the oxen went on again, and as 
the wagon bumped along Jim called back to me, 

“I fergot, Alan, but we’re goin’ to hev’ a little house 
raisin’ soon. Will ye come?” 

“Depend on me for that,” I said. 

“We’re goin’ to live in the wee shanty until it’s up,” he 
shouted, still more stentoriously. 

Now we happened to be just at the Echo Spot on the 
road, and as our voices arose the echoes began to come back. 

“That’s fine,” I called. “That’s — line’’ came back, in 
lower tone, from the hills beyond. 

“Better do it too!” shouted Jimmy. “Do it — too!” came 
the echo, and I swear that, of a sudden, so forlorn felt I 
that it seemed to me as though it were mocking me. 

The last I saw of Jimmy and Hannah there was a sus- 
picious black streak across the purple, and Jimmy’s queer 
old chimney-pot and Hannah’s big straw bonnet were 
merged into a yellow and black blur. 

Well, the “raising” came yesterday, spliced in not too 
badly between the haying and the harvest, which was a good 
thing, for besides the time required to put up the house it 
took some time to go to the spot, Jimmy’s farm being “be- 
yond the Block,” that is beyond the big block of forest land 
still held here by the Canada Land Company. Past his 
place the land has been “taken,” but the settlers have not 
yet come to it, so that between one thing and another 
there is little traffic in that direction and the road is very 
bad, partly rough corduroy which has sunk here and there 
into the mud, while farther on there is no corduroy at all, 
but sticky clay which turns into a slough in wet weather 
and is passable only because of slash thrown across it. 


THE HOUSE BUILDING 77 

Everything considered, one cannot envy poor Jimmy his 
location, and must think that it will take all his cheery 
heart — and Hannah’s — to carry them through. Such as 
this, however, has to be borne with in places all over the 
country, with much vexation to the settlers, and is one of 
the reasons why people are so willing to listen to Macken- 
zie’s speechifying. Since early in June, we hear, he has 
been holding “Union Meetings” in various places, and par- 
ticularly in North York and Simcoe, very openly and above 
board, and not in secret as was the meeting held here in the 
mill. That, I think, was altogether the doing of The School- 
master, who has an odd streak in him ; but maybe there was 
some truth in the menace of Big Bill. 

Jimmy was not the first on his land. Two or three years 
ago it was taken up by a fellow who hacked out a little 
round hole in the bush, burned the logs, built a little barn 
and a very small shanty, and then became weary of the 
loneliness and decamped. 

Since their marriage, Jimmy and Hannah have been liv- 
ing, as they had said they would, in the shanty, which was 
but a poor thing in the first place and is not worth fixing 
up. 

Like two birds building a nest, however, they have been 
over the new house, and Jimmy has been putting two days’ 
work into one, of late, to have everything ready for the 
building. 

Very cheerfully, too. I saw him one day down at the 
Corners, sitting on a load of new boards from the sawmill. 

“Hello, Jimmy,” I said. “How are you getting along?” 

“Oh, tip-top, tip-top,” he replied, smiling from ear to 
ear. “I’ve got the logs fer the house nearly all hewed now. 
Jist came in fer the floorin’, an’ some nails an’ the window 
glass an’ sich like.” 

“How’s the road?” 

He took off his straw hat and scratched his head. 

“Well, that’s the worst of it. It takes a month o’ Sun- 
days to get out an’ in with the oxen, an’ it’s hell on wagons. 
I’ll have a divil of a time gettin’ in with this load. I car- 


78 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

ried the last meal an’ stuff home on my back rather’n be 

bothered with the brutes. But ” cheerfully again — 

“Oh, it might be worse, it might be worse.” 

“And how is Hannah?” 

“Oh, she's happy as a canary-bird, singin’ all the time. 
Hannah’s not one o’ them kind that’s afraid of the bush, or 
minds bein’ alone now an’ again. She’s took hold back 
there like as she’d been there all her life, an’ never a bit 
run out o’ the gab, either. She’s a great woman, Hannah 
is!” 

Jimmy didn’t come out again until it was time to do the 
“astin’,” and then he asked everybody in the settlement, 
finishing up by buying a great load of stuff for the supper. 

Hank told me afterwards that it was rare fun to see him 
poring over Hannah’s list, and trying to make out the 
words, so that between his perplexity and Hannah’s spell- 
ing, Hank had a sore time to keep a straight face. 

“S-u-g-e-r,” he spelled out, pushing his hat back and 
scratching his head, with his face all screwed up with the 
effort, ~“S-u-g — deuce take it, what does that spell, Hank? 
. . . Oh, yes, ‘sugar.’ Why didn’t she put an ‘h’ in? . . . 
‘S-h-u-g-e-r’ spells sugar if I know anything. But mebbe 
Hannah has the new fashion of it. . . . An’ what in the 
Sam Hill is this?” going down the page with his finger, 
“ ‘M-u-s-k-i-v-a-d-e-r’ — now what do ye make o’ that ?” 

“Maybe its ‘Muscovado,’ ” said Hank, “Muscovado sugar, 
you know,” whereupon Jimmy thumped his breeches ecstat- 
ically. “I’ll be blowed ! Sure that’s it ! Now who’d have 
thought Hannah could have spelled ‘muskivader ?’ . . . 
‘F-l-o-w-e-r.’ That’s plain. Gimme 50 pounds of it, Hank. 
But what in the divil is this? T-n-g-i-n-m-e-l-e.’ Kin ye 
make that, Hank?” 

“Perhaps it’s two words, ‘Indian Meal,” suggested Hank, 
and Jimmy spat on the floor with glee. 

“Of course it is, an’ I’m one great thickhead! . . . Now 
here’s ‘p-a-r-e’ — ‘p-a’ — ‘pair,’” with great decision. “Oh 
yes; Hannah told me to ast if yer mother ’ud loan her a 
pair of bakin’ pans until after the raisin’.” 


THE HOUSE BUILDING 


79 

So on through a long list, until finally, all loaded up, 
Jimmy set out, proud as Punch, remarking that he’d “jist git 
a few bottles an’ some tobaccy to top it off.” 

When he reached our place he was whistling with all his 
might, and waved his hand at me to come down to the road. 

“It’s awkard turnin’ in with a load,” he said, excusing 
himself. 

“Why, you have a load, Jimmy,” I said. “What are you 
going to do with all that stuff?” 

“Oh, there’ll be none too much,” he replied, in a very 
off-hand manner. “Seein’ as Hannah an’ me didn’t have 
a weddin’ we want to have a sort o’ blow-out now, sort of 
a weddin’ supper an’ house warmin’ at onst, ye know; an’ 
the vittles’ll be jist as good as they’d ha’ been at the sare- 
mony. There’s to be a hoe-down after. Ye’ll be sure to 
come, Alan?” 

“I’ll be there.” 

“Hank’s cornin’, an* I’ve ast The Schoolmaster,” — with 
conscious pride, — “I’ve ast ’em all, in fact.” 

And so he had. 

When I got to the “clearin’ ” on Friday, almost at the 
turn of the afternoon, there was a big crowd, fellows 
chaffing and laughing and tugging the timbers about, and 
the place fairly fluttering with women and girls in their 
best calicoes and winceys, with Hannah going in and out 
everywhere, laughing and joking, and very gay in her 
wedding gown of purple and green. 

At first opportunity I looked about to see if Barry was 
there. She was not, and I was disappointed in spite of my 
pique, but not surprised, for it is seldom that she attends 
the gatherings in the settlement, and so brings down some 
criticism of her. Neither was Dimple there, having sent 
word with Hank that she feared the bush road might be 
too much for her. 

Since there were so many on hand to do the work, the 
logs were shot up in no time, with Big Bill “Yo-heaving” so 
you could have heard him at the cross-roads, and Dick 
Jones and two or three more running about on top and 


8o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


knocking the corners into shape. Afterwards it took but 
short space to put on the roof and to hammer down the 
floor. Jimmy hadn’t tried to get clapboards, because of 
the long hauling, and so the roof is a “trough” one of 
basswood logs hollowed out, with the grooves interlocking 
to catch the drip, as is the fashion in the farther back 
bush houses. A very good and strong covering it is, too, 
if not so fine as when made of the clapboards. 

As for me, I did very little but sit on the grass with some 
of the other fellows, for so many of us were there that there 
was nothing for the most of us to do. 

“That’s all right,” Jimmy said, when someone apologized. 
“We jist ast ye fer the eatin’ an’ the dance.” 

It was when the last nails were being driven that The 
Schoolmaster arrived, and I heard Jimmy welcoming him 
very respectfully : 

“Indeed it’s proud I am to see this day,” — to which the 
Master replied “Tut! Tut!” Afterwards I heard him of- 
fering to help Jimmy plaster up the chinks and put the 
finishing to the fire-place. “I’m more'n obliged, sir,” said 
Jimmy, quite overpowered. 

All this time the women had been spreading tables on 
the ground, running in and out of the shanty and carrying 
cakes and pies, so that there was presently a great array, 
which soon enough began to disappear when we all set to ; 
and a pretty enough sight it was, with the sky all pink above 
from the sunset, and the great forest all ringed about the 
little clearing, which is round as an apple. 

Before it was quite dark Ned Burns began tuning up his 
fiddle, and that was a signal for the girls to come running 
with lanterns to hang on the wall, while the boys stamped 
about on the new floor testing it for the dancing. Then 
Big Bill took his place in the doorway and in a moment 
they were all at it, Bill beating time with his foot and call- 
ing off the changes at the top of his voice. 

“Ladies, chain!” 

“Swing yer partner roun’ an’ roun’, an’ hoe it down in 
the cor — ner!” 


THE HOUSE BUILDING 81 

“Do see do!” 

“Alaman left an* away ye go!” The words, in a long 
singsong, came out to The Schoolmaster and Hank and me 
as we stood outdoors, a little way from the house, while 
the edge of a big, red harvest moon was appearing above 
the quiet trees to the southeast. 

“Where the deuce did those words come from — ‘do see 
do’ and ‘alaman left’?” Hank asked The Schoolmaster. 

“Why ‘dos d dos’ and ( d la main left/ ” said he. “They 
puzzled me, too, at my first bush dance in this country. 
Then I watched what the dancers did and discovered that 
the movements had kept on better than the words, which, 
I suppose, are a survival of past elegancies in the Old 
Country. . . . Come on, boys. There’s Ned scraping up 
for a quadrille. Get your partners, and I’ll take Hannah.” 

We had a turn at the quadrille and then an eight-hand 
reel and a schottische and polka, too, which were somewhat 
difficult because of the newness of the floor. But some 
zest was taken out of the frolicking for Hank and me be- 
cause our lady-loves were not there. 

As the night wore on the married folk began to leave, so 
that lanterns were taken down from the wall and went off 
down the road into the bush, twinkling like fireflies. In the 
house the light grew dimmer and dimmer, but the dancing 
went on merrily as ever, and no doubt right into the day- 
break, though Hank and The Schoolmaster and I left at 
about two of the clock. 

As we went out, following the dark road with its walls 
of trees, stepping over the poles and logs and avoiding as 
well as we could the holes and mud where water from the 
swampy places had run across, the Master spoke of the 
loneliness of the little bush home we had left. 

“They’d need stout hearts, Jim and Hannah,” he said. 
“It’s well enough now, but wait until the fall and winter 
set in. If only Jimmy had waited a while and gone some- 
where else !” 

“But you know he was in love,” suggested Hank. 

“Oh yes. It’s the way with you young fellows,” returned 


82 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

The Schoolmaster. “And Hannah wouldn’t go too far from 
the Aunt.” Then he stood still and looked into the bush, 
raising his lantern so that the light flashed on the nearest 
tree-trunks and upon a thicket of swamp brush and weeds 
that grew over dark water. 

“It’s a downright shame,” he said, “that they couldn’t 
have had a bit of land off this Block, out near the front 
where they’d have been in some sort of civilization.” 

That gave him an opening to rail at the whole system of 
land distribution in this country and other grievances of 
which I have before written, dilating much upon the Family 
Compact and the Clergy Reserves. 

The Schoolmaster subscribes to no church nor creed, and 
calls himself a Free Thinker, but these things trouble him 
mightily. 

P.S. Almost I have forgotten to say that the news is 
now here of the death of His Majesty King William IV, 
and the coming to the throne of the Princess Victoria, 
daughter of the Duke of Kent, who was the fourth son 
of King George III. The young Queen is but eighteen 
years of age, and, report says, very small and very beauti- 
ful. 

Her coronation was celebrated in Toronto with great 
doings, flag-wavings and speeches, and they tell that in the 
cellar of one house down near the bay an ox was roasted 
whole and then taken on a wagon to the market place for 
a free feast to all who wished to partake. . . . They say, 
too, that the celebration did not stop with the roast beef 
of Old England, but was made an excuse for so much 
roistering that the whole place bade fair to be drunk, and 
that the contagion has spread so that the taverns all over 
the country are even yet busy with the overflow of loyalty, 
which I will believe. 

Even my father has been touched with it, and the other 
night solemnly drank, with Hank’s father, a bumper to the 
health and long life of her pretty Majesty, — which amused 


THE HOUSE BUILDING 83 

me very much, for, strangely enough, he hates the stuff and 
so do I. 

Truly enough it has been said “The King is dead. Long 
live the King!” 

Yet it seems to me that so responsible a place at the head 
of a great Empire must be all too much for a girl not a9 
old as Barry. And yet this young Queen may be sheltered 
and guarded in everything, and not so much open to perils 
as such girls as Barry, who, with all her daring, is some- 
times a worry to me. 

I think I must bury my pride and see her soon. 


CHAPTER IX 


AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER 

S UNDAY night again, and have just returned from 
Hank's, where I went after church. Very warm 
weather. Hank and I did not stroll off as usual, for there 
was staying at his home over the day a man from Toronto 
who talked much about how things are going at the Capital 
— to which Hank and I were very keen to listen. 

As we know, Mackenzie has been much more outspoken, 
of late, in his Constitution , and this man says that talk and 
dissatisfaction increase daily ; that Elliott’s tavern on 
Yonge Street has become a favorite rendezvous of the 
more radical among the Reformers ; and that it is rumored 
that more secret caucuses are held from time to time at 
Doel’s brewery, which is somewhere in the heart of the 
place, but which I do not remember. 

In reply to a question from my father, who was there 
too, as to whether there has been any talk about armed re- 
sistance, as we have heard mooted, he said that he under- 
stands that such is mentioned more and more frequently, 
but that the thing is not taken seriously except by a few 
of the more hot-headed, which is what my father always 
argues must be the case. 

And now I must record how once again I have had an 
encounter which was altogether unexpected, and which I 
do not even yet know was, on the whole, pleasant or other- 
wise. 

Yesterday evening, the work for the day being fairly 
over, I went down to the Corners to get the mail, it being 
time for the weekly visit from the “stage.” 


AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER 85 

As soon as I got there I ran first of all into Hank, who 
said there was a fellow at Mistress Burns’s who wanted to 
be taken up the river right away. 

“I can’t go,” said Hank, “so maybe you’ll do the job.” 

“How far does he want to go ?” I asked. 

“As far as the Gulch. It’s a pretty stiff pull, consider- 
ing the rapids, but he’s to meet somebody there tonight and 
wants to get through.” 

“I’m his man,” said I, for if there is one thing more than 
another that I like it is a river trip of a summer’s evening. 

“You’ll find my canoe around the bend,” said Hank. “I’ll 
'drop in and tell him to go down to the landing and meet 
you.” 

“All serene,” I agreed, giving Hank a poke. “I’ll take 
good care of ‘Dimple.’ ” One day I had discovered that 
name traced in very small letters on the bow, and had made 
it an excuse for teasing. 

“See that you do,” he laughed. “By the way, the fellow 
seems to be an artist or something. He spent all day sketch- 
ing bits about the river, with a crowd of the youngsters at 
his heels. Talks like an Englishman.” 

“All right,” I said. “I’ll manage him.” 

“Be careful at the rapids,” he warned. “The rain has 
swollen the river a bit and it isn’t so easy to see the stones.” 

“I’ll be careful,” I said. 

So off he went one way and I another. 

Hank’s canoe is a beauty. The Schoolmaster helped him 
build it, and an Indian from up the river. It is light and 
strong, graceful as a swallow, and buoyant as an autumn 
leaf on the water. Almost I coveted it as I ran it down 
off the bank. 

In ten minutes I was at the little landing waiting for my 
passenger. It was nearly dark, but a very clear evening, 
and very still, so that the swoop of a nighthawk’s wings in 
the woods beyond could be clearly heard ; and for a quarter 
of an hour I sat there very happily, pushing the canoe out 
a little from time to time to keep it from grating on the 
landing, and looking about, — at the farms on the slopes 


86 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


dimly limned in gray against the black forest, and at the 
houses of . the Corners snuggled down near the river, and 
at the great dome of sky above, intense with almost the blue 
of midnight, only a faint aurora of gold arising from 
the far West to show where the sun had gone down. 

No one was in sight, for the houses do not come very 
close to the landing. “It is,” I was thinking, “the peaceful- 
ness that Barry says ‘is almost pain/ ” and then I heard the 
crunching of shoes on the gravel path above the bank, and 
presently could descry my passenger. Even in the half 
light there was something about his manner of walking 
which revealed him no yokel in his movements as are we 
here in the bush, not so much, I think, because of our work 
as because of our carelessness. 

A few paces nearer he whistled, and I whistled back. 

“Oh, there you are,” he called, “Now will you steady 
that confounded American boat of yours about so I can 
get in?” 

Instantly I recognized the voice. It was that of Howard 
Selwyn, and I swear it gave me a peculiar sort of start, 
though why I do not know. 

Answering nothing I swung the canoe about and prepared 
to steady it with extra caution, but then had reason to know 
that Selwyn spoke only in jest, for scarce had he reached 
the water’s edge than he landed in the canoe, fair in the 
middle and as lightly and surely as any Indian. 

“There!” he said. “That wasn’t so badly done! Now, 
I can manage your infernal roads, and I can dream sweet 
dreams in your log cabins, and eat your pigeon breasts and 
maple sugar with good relish; I can even stomach your 
feather beds and your accent. But when it comes to your 
brand of river-craft it’s hit or miss.” 

“You managed very nicely that time,” I said, as icily as 
I could muster, to which he took no notice. 

“Oh, that was a hit,” he said, seating himself, and pro- 
ceeding to make himself comfortable with a pack of some- 
thing at his back. “Half the time I miss. Would you be- 
lieve it? I’ve upset a canoe twelve times this season. I’m 


AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER 87 

rather superstitious about the thirteenth, so keep it off, like 
a good fellow.” 

“Perhaps you’d prefer someone with a better accent,” I 
said, “to take you up.” 

At which he lookeo up quickly. 

“Oh come, come,” he said. “Can’t you take a joke? Push 
out. My man will be waiting for me by this time, with a 
pan of partridge roasted, and half starved, poor devil, for 
he never will eat a bite until I come.” 

All this time he had been arranging himself, and was at 
last comfortable, with his long shapely legs extended down 
the canoe. 

“Not by any means bush-fashion,” he observed, “but by 
George it’s solid luxury. A canoe in Ontario ! A gondola 
in Venice is nothing to it.” 

He had taken off his hat, and the faint light from the 
West shone full upon him, so that I could see his rather 
long and fair hair blowing back from a forehead as white 
as ever was, though the lower part of his face was somewhat 
browned from the sun and wind. Yes, this Selwyn was 
handsome; with a thrilling personality, too, for one could 
not but be sharply conscious of him. Yet my heart, for 
some reason, did not go out to him, and for that I felt de- 
meaned of myself. For surely the little incident at the 
tavern had not been worth this grudge. 

“A regular lily,” he observed, patting the side of the 
canoe as we swung out a little towards the deeper water 
of the stream. 

“Not that I couldn’t have taken her up the river myself,” 
he went on, “if I had been put to it. I’ve learned to handle 
a paddle, and could manage finely if it weren’t for the ac- 
cursed stones in the bottom. But, you see, there had to be 
someone to bring back the canoe.” 

With that he promptly forgot all about me for a time, 
but looked out to the darkening shore, and, once or twice, 
took a note-book from his pocket and scribbled something, 
though he could not have seen what he was writing. And 


88 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


so we went on to the woods, where the water becomes very; 
smooth, the ground being level. 

As we plunged into it, the way which lay before us ap- 
peared like a channel of darkness, with inky water below, 
and looming black ramparts at either side, whose serrated 
tops pierced a darkly luminous sky. So still was everything 
that nothing was to be heard but the dipping of the paddle, 
and perhaps it was the silence that recalled Selwyn. 

“Ugh! Talk about the Styx!” he said. “Boy, it seems 
to me that you are Charon, so I must be the duffer that’s 
being paddled across. For heaven’s sake, do something to 
break this death!” — but there was a lilt of levity in his 
tone. ^ 

“What can I do, sir?” I said. 

“Nothing,” he replied, gayly, “except keep the canoe off 
the confounded stones.” 

“It’s safe enough here,” I said. “Beyond, at the rapids, 
we’ll have to be more careful, but it will be lighter there.” 

“So there’s nothing to be afraid of here but the dark,” 
he laughed. 

Then presently he began to sing, very softly and in a voice 
richer than any I have ever heard, the “Canadian Boat 
Song,” following it through to the end, and keeping 'the 
rhythm with my paddle, which was here, in almost still 
water, dipping slowly: 

“Faintly as tolls the evening chime , 

Our voices keep tune and our oars keep time, 

Soon as the woods on the shore look dim, 

We'll sing at Saint e Anne's our parting hymn, 

Row, brothers, row, the stream runs fast, 

The rapids are near, and the daylight's past." 

“Do you know that song?” he asked. 

“Yes, sir,” I replied. “It was written on the Ottawa. 
Sometimes I wish Moore had written one for the cahoe, 
too.” 

“So do I,” he assented. “Just another time when the poet 


AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER 89 

forgot to grab the golden opportunity. How do you like 
the alliteration there ? But hold ! Do you know this ? It’s 
appropriate in this place of echoing gloom, or glooming 
echo. I know not which,” — reciting, then: 

“How sweet the answer Echo makes to music at night, 
When , roused by lute or horn, she wakes, 

And far away, o'er lawns and lakes, 

Goes answering light. 

“ Yet Love hath echoes truer far, 

And far more sweet, 

Than e'er beneath the moonlight's star. 

Of horn , or lute, or soft guitar, 

The songs repeat. 

“'Tis when the sigh is quite sincere — 

And only then\ 

The sigh that's breathed for one to hear 
Is by that one, that only dear, 

Breathed back again." 

When he had ended I said nothing, for there was a 
quality of soul-music in his rendering, and a timbre in his 
voice, that affected me strangely. 

“Do you know that?” he repeated. 

“We have Moore's Poems at home, sir,” I replied. (And 
I confess that at this moment, as I write, I have the book 
before me, having taken it down so that I might copy the 
poem.) 

“Were you ever in love?” he asked, then, very lightly. 

“If I had been,” I replied, “I would not likely discuss it 
with a passing stranger.” 

At that he laughed, making me feel uncomfortable, and 
very foolish, and very young, although this man could not 
be so very many years older than I. 

“I see, boy,” he said. “You are in the serious stage yet. 
After a while you’ll get over that, unless this dark forest 
gets too far into your marrow. Don’t take life too seriously. 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


90 

boy. It doesn’t pay. Take all the good things that come 
your way 7 ; don’t look at the unpleasant ones. Gather the 
roses and pass by the rue. That’s my philosophy.” 

“But how would the world go on,” I queried, “if that 
were everyone’s philosophy?” 

He waited, for a moment, while only the dip, dip of the 
paddle broke the silence. 

“You were saying?” he resumed after a little time, as 
though he had been thinking of something else. “Oh, yes. 
Well, take those folk who are always trying to push the 
Universe, — what do they accomplish, after all, except to 
get themselves and other people into an infernal muddle? 
Take those asses, the proletariat, in the French Revolution, 
for instance. Do you know about the French Revolution, 
boy?” 

“I have heard of it,” said I, with some sarcasm, to which 
he seemed quite deaf. 

“What a hell-pot they churned up,” he continued, yawn- 
ing as though the whole question were scarcely worth' con- 
sidering. “And who thanked them for it? Even the poets 
went back on them in the end and sang their disappoint- 
ment.” 

“But such outbreaks may help the next generation,” I 
said. 

“Next generation be ” he began, then ended in a 

laugh. “Cm, I see you’ve got it, boy, — the blood and sacri- 
fice theory — the soul of the Wycliffes and Ridleys and 
Luthers and Cobdens and Brights, half of whom you may 
not have heard of. Perhaps most men get it, for a while, 
if they haven’t been brought up on too much luxury — or 
have had just taste enough of it to tantalize.” 

In the darkness I could hear him yawn again, then he 
went on, almost sleepily. “Take my word for it, boy, 
you’ll fare as well in the end, and perhaps other people, 
too, if you go ahead, mind your own affairs — and pluck all 
the roses you come to. It’s the infernal meddling with other 
people’s business that makes all the trouble in the world.” 

To that there seemed some reason. 


AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER 91 

“But when other people meddle with your business ?” I 
propounded, on second thought. 

“Why, shoot ’em and be done with it,” he replied, flip- 
pantly. “Look after your own affairs, but don’t shoulder 
all the troubles of the world. Let it look after its own. It 
won’t thank you.” 

“But ” I began. 

“For heaven’s sake this is too solemn,” he interrupted. 
“I’m afraid I wasn’t born with the soul of a martyr, boy, 
and so problems don’t interest me greatly. Teach the world 
to look only on beauty and it will forget the rest.” 

“That depends on what one considers beauty, perhaps,” 
I ventured. 

But he laughed me away from further argument. 

“Come, come,” he said, “let’s not spoil the night. Let’s 
talk of love, and music, and poetry. Ever heard this ? — 

“7 love thee so, that, maugre all thy pride, 

Nor wit, nor reason, can my passion hide. 

Do not extort thy reasons from this clause, 

For that I woo, thou therefore hast no cause ; 

But, rather, reason thus with reason fetter, 

Love sought is good, but given unsought is better?’ 

But I knew he was no longer addressing me, nor expect- 
ing me to answer, and so I sank into silence, nor did he 
show interest again until we had entered the rapids, when 
he sat up and watched me, never for a moment afraid, but 
only keen to watch the game with the water and the stones, 
which I could by no means have played had I not been so 
familiar with the spot. 

I meanwhile, in spite of myself, contrasting this man 
and his philosophy of life with such as The Schoolmaster, 
and Mackenzie — of those that I have seen. With his creed 
of not meddling in other folk’s affairs I could give full 
agreement, but the question remained as to what one must 
do if one’s rights, or one’s neighbor’s, were set upon, and 
the old story came to me of someone who once said “Am I 


92 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

my brother’s keeper?” . . . Yet I had to admit a fascination 
about the man, in his voice and manner, and the very grace 
of him, as he sat there in the darkness. Aye, and in a cer- 
tain generosity of him, too, for when we had come out of 
the rapids and I was gaining my breath after the hard 
paddling, having been compelled at last to resort to the 
pole, for recent rains have swollen the stream somewhat, he 
leaned towards me and said : 

“By Jove, boy, I’d give ten years of my life to have such 
muscle and wind as yours !” 

“Perhaps you haven’t practiced so much, sir,” said I. 

“But the length of you ! And the breadth of your shoul- 
ders !” he said. “How tall are you ?” 

“Six feet one in my socks,” said I. 

“And how much do you weigh?” 

“About thirteen stone.” 

“Yet you are only a lad,” he said. “The ‘bush,’ as you 
call it, has given you a good deal, hasn’t it?” 

“A great deal, sir,” I said. 

“And you will settle down and become a part of it,” he 
went on, so that I scarcely knew what he meant. “You 
will marry and live in a little gray house among the trees. 
Now, what about that little tavern girl on the road beyond 
there ? Barbara, is it, that they call her ? What about her ?” 

“I have nothing to say about her,” I replied, shortly. “We 
have come to the Gulch. Where will you get out ?” 

“Oh, the Gulch, is it?” he said. “An infernal looking 
spot, too, to which you have brought me, at the end of the 
Styx. Looks like some of the Plutonian shades to which 
Dante and Virgil descended. You saw to it that you paddled 
me far enough from the fair Beatrice, didn’t you? But, 
Boy, I’ve no grudge against you. After all ’twas my own 
doing, or rather that of that clown, Downs. . . . What ho, 
there, Downs ! What ho !” and, looking over his shoulder, he 
gave a shrill whistle which was answered from a little dis- 
tance. 

“Well,” he said, turning back to me, all his air of jaunty 
levity returned to him. “So you have nothing to say about 


AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER 93 

the little girl over at the tavern? Think that over, lad. 
She’s a little posy — no, by Jove, a regular Pocahontas! 
Think it over, lad. Pluck the roses while you may; that’s 
my advice.” 

Now I confess that at this my choler arose, albeit with- 
out any very definite reason. I could not bear the name of 
Barry on this man’s lips, and yet less the light air with 
which he spoke. But I kept my thought to myself, and, a 
moment later, perceiving the gleam of a fire between the 
trees and on the water, made for it and drew up the canoe 
to the shore. 

Selwyn sprang out as lightly as he had come in, then 
taking a coin from his pocket tossed it into the canoe. 
“There,” he said, “I’m much obliged to you.” 

Now I have no compunction about taking money for 
honest work, when I have bargained with a man, but the 
thought of being paid by Howard Selwyn, with whom I had 
not bargained at all, and in such fashion, must have stuck 
in my crop. At all events, no sooner had the coin struck 
the bottom than I felt the hot blood in my face, and the 
next second the bit of metal was jingling on the slab of 
rock at his feet. 

“I do not take money from you, Howard Selwyn,” I said, 
and raised my paddle to push out. 

But he was quicker than I, and before I could collect 
myself had gripped the canoe and was holding it to the shore 
as though in a vise of iron. 

“By George !” he said, peering at me through the dark- 
ness. “Now I know you’re the young callant who refused 
to water my horse some weeks ago. I’ve been trying to 
place you all the way up.” 

“I’ll be thankful to you if you will let me go,” I said. 

But he did not release the canoe. Instead he gave a low 
whistle, and then laughed, 

“It’s all right, old chap,” he said, and somehow I knew 
that he thought me jealous over Barry, and was glad of 
the darkness that covered the guilty reddening of my face. 


THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


94 

for it shamed me to know that I could be jealous over 
such trifling excuse as he had given me. 

“See here,” he said, “You hate me, don’t you?” 

“No, sir.” 

“Well — you don’t like me, to say the least.” 

“Perhaps.” 

He laughed again, and drew the canoe along until he 
was very close to me. 

“Now,” he said, “have you any reason for hating me?” 

To which I could only reply that I had not, except that 
I was not accustomed to being ordered to do things by 
strangers, nor to having money thrown me like a bone to a 
dog. 

“I know,” he said, when I had finished. “I should not 
have done that. But, on my oath I did it of habit. In the 
length and breadth of this bush I have received hospitality 
and had my pay refused, but I have not yet found a youth 
— and you are only a lad — who spurned a gold piece even 
though tossed to him. I meant well. But, honestly, boy, 
I knew you of finer clay. If I had not, how could I have 
talked with you as I did on the way up? How could I 
have recited to you ' The Echo’? How could I speak to you 
as I am now? Now, lad, make it up with me, won’t you?” 

Never have I heard a voice so persuasive. Even as he 
spoke he drew me, and so I laid my hand upon the one 
which he extended to me and did not realize my grip until 
he exclaimed with the pain of it, then laughed. 

“‘Hold off, Macduff!’” he cried. “Now you see that’s 
how I gather some of my roses. I make friends of ene- 
mies. Will you come up and have a smoke? No? — Then 
good-night, and thank you, and remember me to pretty 
Barbara. She will tell you I stayed at the tavern last 
night.” 

As I pushed out into the stream I heard his “man,” evi- 
dently, approaching, for Selwyn’s voice sounded over the 
water : 

“Hello, there, Downs ! Got the horses fixed all right ?” 

To which came a less musical note: “Ay, sir. They’re 


AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER 95 

hall shod han’ ready, sir. Han’ the camp’s hall ready, too, 
sir, so you can myke yourself at ’ome roight awy, sir.” 

So now I have given the grip of confidence to Howard 
Selwyn, though why I did so I cannot tell, for I swear I do 
not like him — yet like him in the same breath, I must con- 
fess. 

One thing, however, I have learned: Since I have ex- 
perienced it myself I have less cause to be displeased with 
little Barry’s fascination by him. 

And so he stayed at the tavern last night. 

Well, I have given him the grip of confidence. 


CHAPTER X 


TO A FAR COUNTRY 

O N Thursday morning our neighborhood was startled 
by the news that Mrs. Deveril had died suddenly. Big 
Bill, who was going up to the Village in his wagon, carried 
the news, telling anyone he met on the road and shouting it 
to the men in the fields and the women in the yards as he 
passed. 

At our place he called it over the fence to me, and I went 
in to tell my mother. 

She was plaiting hats for us, of the tough new straw, the 
long coils of the braid lying about her feet, but she arose 
at once and began to roll it up. 

“I must go to Barry at once,” she said. “Perhaps I can 
do something.” 

We are not prodigal with caresses in our house — the 
understanding affection among us is too deep to require 
much demonstration, — but at that moment I drew my 
mother into my arms and kissed her. I think she feels, as 
I do, that such occasional outburst means more than con- 
tinual expressions that come to mean comparatively little, 
were it only for f .equency, and usually when I show my 
feeling to her thus she looks up at me with all the mother- 
love in her gray eyes and makes believe to scold me for my 
boyishness; but this time she neither looked nor smiled, 
for which I loved her, for I knew that her thought was all 
of Barry. 

My father drove her over in the wagon, and at nightfall 
she returned, finding pie already washed and dressed to go 
to my girl. 

“Yes,” she said, “I think Barry may be glad to have you. 
96 


TO A FAR COUNTRY 97 

I came away because the house was filling. I suppose 
there’ll be a wake.” 

At which the heart of me turned resentful. 

“I hate wakes,” I said. 

“So do I,” returned my mother, “but it is the custom.” 

“And I suppose there’ll be pipes — and drinking,” I said, 
bitterly enough. “Mother, will Barry have to face that 
rabble ?” 

“I don’t think so,” she replied. “Mistress Jones has 
taken charge ” 

“Of course,” I interrupted, for this news pleased me none 
too well. 

“She’s very capable,” said my mother. 

“Well, for one thing Barry may be thankful — she’ll en- 
tertain the crowd.” 

But at that my mother raised a checking finger to me. 

“Come, come,” she said. “You are over hard on Mistress 
Jones. Here, let me brush you.” And with that she made 
much ado to broom off a coat from which I had already 
knocked every mote of dust. Often she does that, but I 
permit her, out of lovingness to her lovingness. 

The evening was very still. As I walked along the bush 
path, through the Golden-Winged Woods, it seemed to me 
that all the air held an unusual silence. And then I real- 
ized that it was the' brooding of Death that had settled 
upon me and thrown its quiet mantle over the trees; for 
there had been other times, when, going through to meet 
Barry, the whole of the dim shades had seemed to be full 
of light and song, and when I had returned to earth sud- 
denly, to find that all the light and all the song were in my 
own soul. 

That night, however, I walked along, half awed and 
thinking about Death, which is not common enough yet, in 
this new country, to be easily dismissed. What is It ? What 
does It mean? Why are we placed here for so short time 
when we must needs spend so much of life in the struggle 
to be fed and clothed? Why cannot life last for one thou- 
sand years so that people might go on to really great ac- 


98 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

complishment before being snuffed out like a candle? Of 
all this did I ponder as I walked along, more slowly than 
usual, in the growing darkness, winding in and out among 
the great boles of the trees. And then I remembered a ser- 
mon that the minister had preached about Heaven, a city 
as broad as long, and as high as broad, with streets of gold, 
and walls of precious stones, and gates of pearl, and the 
spirits of the dead walking about in white robes, playing 
on harps forever and ever. 

On the way home The Schoolmaster and Hank and I 
walked together. 

“Well, what did you think of that?’ asked Hank, in his 
direct way. 

“Bosh! All bosh!” exclaimed The Schoolmaster. “A 
sort of celestial Bastile, by George! A holy cubicle just 
big enough for the elect, — with need of a hades big enough 
to catch all the left-overs — including all the radical and un- 
orthodox, of course. Bosh ! All bosh !” 

At that we laughed, and I was glad that my dear mother 
was not by, for she always feels that one should be very 
solemn and filled with awe when sacred subjects are men- 
tioned, and might not have understood that we laughed 
only at The Schoolmaster’s interpretation of the minister’s 
sermon, and a little at the sermon itself, but not in the 
least at anything truly sacred or holy. 

After that we asked The Schoolmaster what he really 
thought about Heaven. 

“Now, you know,” he said, “I’ve only my own idea about 
it. But that is that things’ll not be different enough to be 
strange. We’re Persons, boys. Each one of us is a Person. 
What would be the sense of making us one sort of per- 
sonality, with one set of likings and aspirations and de- 
sires, and then changing us in the wink of an eye when 
Death comes, to something altogether different? Phut! 
The economy of the Universe wouldn’t stand for such a 
waste of energy. Put Red Jock there at twanging a harp 
and walking about in white skirts ! Phut ! Bosh and non- 
sense !” 


TO A FAR COUNTRY 99 

At that Hank and I shouted with laughter, as we looked 
at Red Jock striding ahead of us, gnarly and rugged, with 
hairy arms of brawn and big hands knuckly from use of 
the blacksmith’s hammer. 

“I’ll bet he’d prefer a forge in the other place,” ventured 
Hank. “Let’s see what he thinks about it. Hallo, Jock!” 

Red Jock turned about and waited for us. 

“Well, Jock, and what did you think of the sermon?” 
asked The Schoolmaster. 

Jock took off his big straw hat and scratched his head. 

“Weel,” he said, “Ah’ve juist been thinkin’ aboot it an’ 
tryin’ tae reckon it oot, but the ’rithmetic o’t ’s got me 
beat. . . . Noo, Dominie, hoo far d’ye tell me is a fur- 
long ?” 

“By our measure an eighth of a mile,” said The School- 
master. 

“An’ the City wis twal thousan’ furlongs ilka way. That 
wad be ?” 

“About fifteen hundred miles,” replied The Schoolmaster. 

Red Jock pondered for a minute. “It’s a braw big 
place,” he said. “A lot o’ fowk cud be packed in’t, specially 
them spirit buddies that, Ah doot, cud squeeze up fine gin 
the croodin’ wis ower muckle. . . . But the height o’t ’s 
the same as the length an’ breadth o’t?” 

“So it is said,” replied The Schoolmaster. 

“That wad be sort o’ square ilka way, like the bit boxies 
the tea comes in.” 

The Schoolmaster nodded, his lips twitching in endeavor 
to keep a straight face. 

This gave Red Jock long pause, as he strode along beside 
us. Then he turned to us with a twinkle in his eye. 

“Ah’m dootin’ ” he said, “ ’at the puir bodies maun be 
unco’ keen tae get oot whan they had tae mak’ sic a wa’ 
tae haud them in.” 

When The Schoolmaster could get in a word for our 
laughing, “But the wall was only one hundred and forty 
and four cubits,” he said. 

“Aye? An’ hoo lang d’ye say is a cubit?” 


100 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


“My dictionary says as long as from a man’s elbow to 
the end of his middle finger,” replied The Schoolmaster. 

Whereupon Jock extended his great arm in its homespun 
sleeve, and calculated. 

“Juist a hunner and forty-fower o’ them!” he exclaimed 
presently. “Hoots, mon! The buddies ’ud be ower that 
an’ awa’ afore ye cud say ‘Jock Robinson’ !” 

Even yet I can see the Master standing still in the middle 
of the road and bending double with his laughter over this 
sally, while Hank and I were good seconds to him, and Red 
Jock looked on with a grim smile. 

“Of course you know, Jock,” remarked The Schoolmaster 
when he could, “I’m not an authority on ancient measure- 
ments. . . .” Then he became very serious. 

“I’ve an idea,” he said, “that all that talk about the City 
is figurative. It’s very beautiful, too. Don’t you think its 
being as long as broad, and as high also, might mean, Jock, 
that it’s a sort of four-square place — all-round fair and 
square, with a square deal for everybody ?” 

Jock looked at the Master quickly, staring for a mo- 
ment, his bushy brows raised. Then the light of under- 
standing came into his blue eyes. 

“Noo ye’re sayin’ it !” he agreed. 

“And I’ve an idea,” went on The Schoolmaster, “that 
things’ll seem natural enough, and that the Dead come back 
to see the folk at home when they want. Where Heaven is 
I don’t know, nor what spirit bodies are like, but I guess 
they’ll have powers far beyond what these possess. Some- 
times I look up at the stars and wonder if, some day, we 
shall not pass from one to another with less trouble than 
it now takes to go up to the Village. There must be great 
things ahead of us, my lads, and I guess doing the best we 
can here will give us a good push ahead over there.” 

Red Jock had hung on every word, and, indeed, so had 
Hank and I also. 

“Then ye’ll no be thinkin’,” he queried, “ ’at we’ll hae tae 
be tinklin’ on wee harpies a’ the time ?” 

This, following on the heels of our previous remarks, 


IOI 


TO A FAR COUNTRY 

gave the Master a sore time again to keep from smiling, but, 
seeing that Jock was quite serious, he quickly gained con- 
trol of himself. 

‘Tm thinking,” he said, “that there’ll be plenty of useful 
work for everyone, — everyone to his interest, you know.” 

“An’ there’ll no be trampin’ aboot on hard gowd walks 
’at ’s like tae mak’ corns on yer taes?” persisted Jock. 

The Master’s face twitched, while Hank and I, out of 
discretion, dropped a pace or two behind. 

“It’s my belief,” replied he, “that there’ll be trees, and 
grass, and flowers, as well as friends, — and sunrises and 
sunsets, too.” 

“An’ maybe a wee burnie wimplin’ amang the rashes?” 

“Why not?” 

“An’ sweeps o’ heather ower the braes?” 

“Why not?” 

Red Jock turned to The Schoolmaster right-about. “Noo, 
ye’ll no be thinkin’ there might be a bit smiddie at the edge 
o’ the bush, gin ye wanted it?” he asked. 

The Schoolmaster nodded, smiling. 

“An’ bit nags tae come trottin’ in, whinnerin’ at ane 
anither, wi’ their feet tae be tended till?” 

“If the smithy was there there’d need to be the horses, 
Jock. I’ve never just seen why animals that people have 
loved should not persist, too. My little dog, Blazer, could 
give lessons in honor and fidelity to a good many people.” 

Jock strode on again, looking straight ahead, thinking. 

Then presently he brought his big hand down with a 
thud on the side of his breeches. 

“It’s a braw conception o’t,” he said. “Accordin’ tae that 
Ah’d think na mair o’ deein’ than o’ gangin’ across tae Tam 
Tamson’s slashin’ bee 1” 

“No,” returned The Schoolmaster. “Death must be a 
natural thing, after all, Jock.” 

“An’ no a curse at a’, as we’ve been telled.” 

“Perhaps an open door, rather. The good God is a God 
of Love, so it is said, in plain words. There can be nothing 
figurative about that.” 


102 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


Again Red Jock strode on, leading us, and presently, to 
keep him thinking, the Master asked: 

“What do you think about hell, Jock?” 

Jock rubbed his chin. Then he parried the question 
adroitly. 

“Ye’ll be dootin’ ” he queried, glancing sidewise at the 
Master, “ ’at it’s maybe no sae het as they mak oot?” 

The Schoolmaster laughed. 

“I’m afraid the thought of it isn’t bothering me as much 
as some think it should,” he said. “I’m too busy trying to 
walk straight myself, as I see it, to have much time left to 
think of the punishment if I don’t.” 

“But the — the hell-fire an’ brimstane business,” persisted 
Jock. “It’ll be what ye dub figgerative talk, as weel ?” 

“As I see it, just that,” said The Schoolmaster. 

Jock nodded, with decision. 

“Ah’ve mony a time thocht o’t whan Ah’ve been blawin’ 
at the forge,” he went on, “an’ Ah’ve figgered oot either ’at 
the fire maun be cooler than the meenisters say, or else 
’at the puir spirit buddies maun be no sae sensitive. . . . 
Noo ye’ll be meanin’, Ah doot, ’at thae rampin’ an’ roarin’ 
fires is juist fires o’ tribulation.” 

The Schoolmaster glanced at him, a bit surprised, I 
thought. 

“Aye, Jock. And of purification, above all things.” 

“Noo ye’ve said it!” exclaimed Jock. “Why cudna Ah 
hae worrit that oot fer masel ? Why Ah’ve cast a bit airn 
intil the fire all grimed wi’ mud an’ dirt, an’ it’s cam’ oot 
clean as a whustle. . . . Ye’ll be sayin’ it’s that way wi’ 
oorsels, ony the fires ’ll be in oor ain herts juist, an’ no 
bumin’ aff oor bit fingers an’ taes, an’ scorchin’ aff the 
hairs o’ oor scalpies.” 

Whereupon The Schoolmaster gave him a slap on the 
back. 

“Ye’ve strayed far frae the auld kirk, Ah doot, Jock,” 
he laughed. 

But at that Jock bristled. “No sae far as some o’ them 


TO A FAR COUNTRYj io 3 ; 

thocht,” he said. “For Ah doot we’re a’ strivin’ tae gang 
the ane road, an’ it’s ony oor bit nags ’at ’s deeferent.” 

Every word of this dialogue came back to me now (al- 
though I fear I have made poor hand at writing down the 
brogue of Red Jock), as I walked towards the very pres- 
ence of Death, — and especially did The Schoolmaster’s little 
sermon come to me, I wondering much about Mrs. Deveril. 

And then I began to wonder about the history of the 
woman, of which never a word had been spoken to anyone 
in the settlement, to my knowledge. Reticent and cynical, 
she had gone her own way, and now she had slipped off 
into the Unknown, with sealed lips. 

In the little that I myself had seen of her, she had ap- 
peared a woman of some education, who had bequeathed 
to Barry the tongue which she spoke, and yet I had tried 
to close my eyes to some little commonnesses in her that 
put her out of the same standing as my mother. To my 
Journal I may confess that I had never liked Mrs. Deveril, 
nor quite forgiven her for marrying Old Nick. And yet 
Barry had been the outcome of that union. 

Coming out from the wood I could see lanterns twink- 
ling about the tavern yard, and when I reached the door 
saw the place filled with people. But my heart was softer 
now, and I knew that the most of them had come in kind- 
ness of heart. For in this bush country, after all, we stand 
shoulder to shoulder. 

There was quiet talking, but no roughness anywhere, 
although there were men on the benches outside and in 
groups about the yard. Looking among the women in the 
house I could not discover Barry, but Mistress Jones came 
to me. 

“ Would ye like to see the corp?” she asked, but I shook 
my head and asked for Barry. 

“She’s disappeared,” she whispered, “clean an' clever, — 
never a sight of her since six o’clock. An’ everybody askin' 
how she’s takin’ it, too! But Nick’s in there with Big Bill 


io 4 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

an’ some of ’em. He thought mebbe the bar ought to be 
open, free-handed like, but I put my foot on that. ‘Never 
a drop/ said I, ‘but mebbe a wee jug onst an hour or so. 
Throw that bar open, Nick Deveril/ sez I, ‘an’ you know 
what’ll happen. It ’ud be a disgrace/ sez I. ‘An’ no 
meanness in you not to let it, either. This isn’t no loggin’, 
this isn’t/ ” 

With that I saw someone beckoning to me from the back 
door, and when I reached her was surprised to find Old 
Meg, whom I did not know for the reason that her head 
was uncovered, and her shawl and stick lacking. Not so 
old did she look at all, for her hair is quite black and wavy, 
when one can see it, and her eyes good enough, keen and 
dark and maybe a bit solemn. 

When she spoke, too, there was a different quality in her 
tone that made me look sharply; but yes, truly enough it 
was Old Meg, with the brown skin and sharp features, 
who weaves homespun for her neighbors but has little else 
to do with them, and goes hobbling about our roads with 
her stick. 

“Come out,” she whispered. “I’ll take you to Barry. 
You don’t want to see the ‘corp/ as Sally Jones calls it.” 

There was something in the flippancy with which she 
spoke that made me shudder, and yet I perceived that what 
levity there was was directed against Mistress Jones. 

I followed her out across the back yard and down a little 
path that led to the beginning of the trees, she keeping 
ahead of me, like something of thicker darkness than the 
night, and saying never a word at all. 

Where the trees began again, she stopped and called 
gently : 

“Barry! Bar— ry!” 

There was a rustling among the grass quite near us, and 
Barry stood up. 

“What is it, Meg?” she asked. “Bo — do they want me?” 

“Never a want, my dear,” said Meg. “And if they did I’m 
the last one to tell them where to find you. It’s just a young 
gentleman here, that you’ll maybe like to see.” 


TO A FAR COUNTRY 


105 

Then I spoke to my girl, and she came to me very quickly 
and put her two hands in mine. So we stood, and when we 
turned about again Meg was nowhere to be seen. 

“It was good of you to come, Alan/’ said Barry. “Sit 
down here. I — I don’t want to go where there are — 
people.” 

We sat down on the dry, brown grass, and I did not know 
what to say at all. 

In the interval a cricket chirped and chirped, and a 
wagon rattled down the road; then Barry broke the long 
tension. 

“It was good of you to come, Alan,” she repeated, speak- 
ing in a low, hurried voice. “I needed someone, but not 
those people in there. They’re kind, everyone — but — Alan, 
I think I know now why a wild animal goes off by itself 
when it’s wounded.” 

“You’ve been wounded,” I said, closing my hand over 
hers, and she let it remain so. 

“Over something more than just — mother,” she said. “I 
— Alan, I’ve been wondering, and wondering if I have failed 
all along in — what — I should have been to her.” 

“But no, Barry,” I said. “You’ve been — wonderful.” 

She would not hear of that. “I’ve helped with the work,” 
she said, “but I owed that for my living and the freedom 
she gave me. It isn’t that, Alan. Alan, my mother never 
loved me much. Perhaps I’ve been to blame.” 

“Surely she loved you,” I argued. “Some people don’t 
show their feelings, you know. She may have been one of 
them.” 

Barry withdrew her hand, and in the darkness I saw her 
bring her knees up and clasp her hands about them in the 
pensive attitude that I knew. 

“She did not love me much,” she repeated, sadly. “She 
did well by me. She gave me clothes and taught me to read, 
and to speak in the language of the — educated. My mother 
was an educated woman, Alan. I never could under- 
stand ” 

She hesitated, and I knew that her thought was mine. 


BO 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“But your father ” I began. 

“Yes, my father, too/’ she said. “Yet I cannot under- 
stand. My mother never told me the story of their lives. 
I know nothing. Tonight I feel like a little leaf blown 
out on a big gray sky with no anchorage anywhere. If I 
knew anything of my mother’s people — anything. But I 
do not.” 

“If you asked Mr. Deveril?” I suggested. 

“He knows no more than I,” she said, quickly. “He does 
not care.” 

Again she sat silent for a long time, and the cricket 
chirped. 

“This morning,” she began, presently, “I took the key to 
lock the drawers of mother’s bureau. One never knows, 
you know, what may happen when the house is open. Not 
that anyone would take anything, — but there might be 
meddlers. I can’t tell you why I did it, but I drew open 
one of the drawers. There was a little packet there, with 
my name written upon it. I have it here, Alan, hidden. 
If you will get a lantern I’ll show it to you.” 

“You wish me to see it?” I asked, to make sure. 

“I wish you to see it.” 

And so I hurried to the stables and came back with a 
lantern, being careful to keep the tin side turned towards 
the tavern, so that no one might see. 

Barry arose as the light of it flashed upon her. “Come,” 
she said, and I followed her into the thick of the trees. 

At the end of a hollow log she sat down, and drew from 
it the little parcel of yellowed paper. So I sat down beside 
her and turned the light so that it would fall on her small 
brown hands. 

Untying the string, she thrust the packet before me. I 
drew back the cover and there lay before me two tiny 
moccasins, all worked with porcupine quills, such as Indian 
children wear. I took them up and turned them over and 
over, but there was neither word nor mark. 

“Evidently my mother, in her younger days, had my lik- 
ing for the Indians,” said Barry, smiling a little, and taking 


TO A FAR COUNTRY. 107 

them from me. “I wonder if ever I wore those,” she went 
on. “Perhaps they left me my Indian moods. Now, look 
at this/’ and she drew from the paper something wrapped 
in birchbark, which she unfolded. I raised the lantern to 
see, and perceived the silhouette of a man’s head and face, 
mapped in solid black on thick light paper, — a fine head, 
with clear-cut features and hair that seemed to wave back- 
ward from a broad, high brow. 

“There is no name,” she said, “not a syllable. I wonder 
who he was. Some relative, surely, or this would not have 
been placed in a parcel addressed to me.” 

“Evidently,” I said. “Keep this, Barry. Some day there 
may be a clue.” 

There was more talk, she going back to her fears that 
she had not been a more loving daughter else she had been 
more loved. “There always was a distance between us,” 
she said. “Yet she was kind to me — very kind to me. 
The fault has been mine.” 

And then she began to brush away the tears that fell, and 
so we sat for a long time, and after a little I told her all of 
The Schoolmaster’s sermon, to which she listened with in- 
terest, seeming to gain some Comfort. 

“Come,” she said, afterwards. “I must go in. There’ll 
be the wake, but I’m going to bed. There will be things to 
do tomorrow.” 

At the door we said good-bye, Old Meg there meeting 
her, and then I slipped away in the darkness and through 
the woods home. 

• •#•••• 

Ever since I have been planning how I can take care of 
her if she will come to me. Soon I must ask her, for I can- 
not long bear this waiting. 


CHAPTER XI 


AN EXCITING NIGHT 

Y ESTERDAY evening, shortly before nightfall, there 
came up such a storm as we have not had this sum- 
mer, blowing straight from the west, with a driving rain, 
so that it has wrought some havoc with the harvest. For 
a long time my father and I sat sheltered in the barn, look- 
ing out at it, and unable to get to the house without being 
wet to the skin. In great sheets, wave after wave, the 
rain came, and in the intervals between we could see the 
tops of the trees in the Golden-Winged Woods lashing 
against the sky, while, nearer, a field of grain not yet har- 
vested bent flat and shining before the hurricane. All of 
the barnyard was filled with pools, and the hens had taken 
shelter under the wagon and anywhere else that promised 
refuge, while the path to the house was turned into a 
small bright river that caught what light there was left in 
the sky. 

At last the storm ceased long enough for us to go in, and 
when I went up to my room at about ten of the clock, it 
was fairly well over. After blowing out my candle I stood 
for a moment looking out of the window. The rain had 
stopped, and the wind also, although it appeared to be still 
blowing in the upper air, for the sky was filled with jagged 
black clouds that hurried across the face of the moon, 
causing alternate light and darkness. “It would be bad 
traveling in the bush tonight/’ I thought, and thanked my 
stars that I did not chance to be out in it. 

About an hour later, when we were all sleeping soundly, 
we were aroused by a thumping at the door. 

“Go down, Alan,” called my mother, “and see who is 
there.” 

108 


AN EXCITING NIGHT 109 

And so, while still little more than half awakened, I 
tumbled into my trousers and went down. 

When I opened the door who should be there but Barry, 
bareheaded and with a black shawl about her. 

“For heaven’s sake! Barry!” I exclaimed, wide enough 
awake now in all conscience. “Is it you ? Come in. What’s 
the matter?” 

“No,” she said, all out of breath, “I mustn’t stop.” But 
she stepped inside and sat upon a chair beside the door. 

“You must get Billy at once,” she said, “and go for the 
Doctor. It’s Jim’s Hannah. She fell on a sickle and cut 
her arm.” 

By this time I had lighted a candle from some coals still 
in the fire-place, and my father and mother were coming 
down the ladder. 

“Barry, dear child!” exclaimed my mother, and then 
Barry had to tell her story over again while she sat there, 
with her shawl thrown back, and the water dripping from 
it and from her long black hair into little pools on the 
floor. 

“Dear, dear! Hurry, Alan! Hurry!” said my mother, 
but I was already lacing my boots, which I had left by the 
fire to dry. 

“Jim got as far as our place,” explained Barry, when 
she could get breath again, while my mother fanned her 
with a paper, for she was much flushed with running, “so 
I told him to go back to Hannah, and that I would run 
over here and send Alan. He had tied up her arm as well 
as he could.” 

“Dear, dear!” exclaimed my mother again, in real dis- 
tress. “Father, can’t I go with you?” for my father was 
preparing for the journey and lighting the lantern. 

“No,” he said. “I’ll get Mistress Jones. She’s stronger 
than you.” 

And with that Barry stood up and drew her wet shawl 
about her. 

“I’m going,” she said, “and, if you don’t mind, I’ll run 
on ahead. I’m used to running,” nor would she listen to 


no THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


my mother’s entreaties that she would wait for dry stock- 
ings, submitting only to having the shawl changed. 

As she went out again into the wild night, I was with 

her. 

“Hurry, Oh hurry, Alan!” she said. “I’m afraid it’s 
serious. Don’t bother about me.” 

“Well,” I said, “go on, Barry. But don’t kill yourself 
running; you’ll make better time in the end.” 

And with that she set off towards the road and I towards 
the stable, making over the ground at full speed. Just one 
moment did I pause, as Blucher came bounding to me, to 
point towards the way she had gone. 

“Go with Barry, good dog! Stay with her!” 

But an instant he hesitated, looking at me, with ears 
raised, as though to gather my meaning, and then" he was 
off like a little streak of black, yelping to tell that he was 
on the way. He has no scruples about following Barry, 
for usually he has been with us on our strolls, and he 
knows her and loves her well. 

A few moments later Billy and I were galloping through 
the open gateway at the road, and I could just see Barry, 
hurrying along, but not now running, with Blucher per- 
forming circles about her. 

As Billy and I turned the opposite way, heading for the 
Village, the pools along the road shone like silver ; the next 
moment I could not see them at all, for the clouds had 
gone over the moon, and the muddy water was splashing up 
to my saddle. Billy was doing his best in such spot, but I 
urged him the harder, for the vision of Hannah, perhaps 
bleeding to death, and the distress of good, big-hearted 
Jimmy, went before me in the darkness. She should be 
saved if Barry, and Billy, and the Doctor and I could 
save her. 

Only once before we got out of the bush road, Billy 
stumbled, then in the more open farming tract the light 
was better and the road smoother, and so, he being now 
warmed up to his task, I put him to it, and he stretched 


AN EXCITING NIGHT 


hi 


out his neck and legs in response, making ahead as though 
he knew how much depended upon him. 

As we clattered through the Corners there was never a 
light in any of the houses, but heads were thrust out of 
windows to see what manner of wild riding was this so 
close upon the midnight. Once or twice, too, there was a 
halloo after me, but I neither drew up nor spoke, but kept 
on at the same pace up to the Village highway, praying 
that the moon would stay out, for the sake of our return 
journey up the long dark road to Jimmy’s, and for the 
sake of little Barry who must now be toiling up it. She 
would not be afraid, I knew, for the bush was home to her 
more than to most girls, and often had I heard her say that 
the wild animals were not to be feared if one forbore to 
tamper with them; and I remembered how she laughed 
when telling me about how once she had met a bear, the 
two of them looking at each other in astonishment, and of 
how it had made away with all speed when she took off her 
shawl and shook it at it. All of which daring is justified, at 
least at this season when food is plentiful. In winter when 
the wolves are more likely to come about, it is a different 
matter. 

The bits of gaping causeway and the bogs along The 
Block, were more to be feared on such a night as this, 
and I was glad to know that Blucher was with Barry 
for company, and that my father was following and would 
find her should she meet with accident. 

“Go on, Billy!” I said to my good horse, as I bent low 
over his neck. “You and I must do as well as Barry!” 
And as he shot on under the pressure of my heel the very 
heart of me surged with pride for her bravery. Barry, 
most wonderful of girls ! 

At the Village, by the grace of God, the Doctor was at 
home, although it took some hammering upon the door to 
awaken him, for so few are the calls in this healthful cli- 
mate, that he is not accustomed to them in the night, and 
under no tension which might arouse him quickly. 

“Hannah Scott? You don’t say so!” he exclaimed, fas- 


1 12 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


tening his buttons. “Get my horse, lad, and I’ll be with 
you. Wait — I’ll get you the lantern.” 

And so, in a moment, he appeared with it, lighted, and 
when he came out finally with his bag of bottles and band- 
ages, I was there waiting with the horses, and rubbing 
down Billy, the two of them standing with pricking ears, 
no doubt wondering much what all this midnight flurry was 
about. 

“Good girl, Hannah,” remarked the Doctor, as he pre- 
pared to mount. “She worked for my wife once, before 
our second girl was born. Now then, Alan, I’ll run you a 
race.” 

A moment later we were galloping side by side, and I 
could hear the Doctor puffing like a grampus, for he has 
become fat for want of exercise, and is not used to such 
riding. 

Never a word did either of us speak until we had passed 
home and turned up the road by The Block. 

“Whew!” he said, as we slowed the horses to a walk, — 
“Haven’t ridden like that for years. Thought it was going 
to shake the gizzard out of me.” All the time mopping his 
face and bald head with his handkerchief. 

For a little the moon shone over the trees, but it was 
beginning to sink towards the west. By its light we could 
see the causeway, like an uneven, glimmering ladder, prone 
on the ground, with black pools of water at the sides of 
it and running under. Here I took the lead, being more 
accustomed to the way, the Doctor following close behind, 
and much perturbed over the risk that the horses might 
break their legs ; and, indeed, the animals themselves seemed 
to fear the possibility, for they stepped gingerly, feeling 
with their feet, at times, before trusting weight to them. 

At my back, I could hear the Doctor steadying his beast, 
which is mettley and nervous, and likely to lose its head, 
in which case the Doctor would have been in sad plight. 

“Steady, lad, steady! You’re doing fine! Easy, now, — 
easy !” 

Then : 


AN EXCITING NIGHT 113 

‘‘What are you jumping about, old boy? Did you never 
see a tree before? — Easy, lad, easy! Mind, it isn’t a New 
York pavement you’ve got your feet on!” 

Presently his patience seemd to be exhausted, and I knew 
that the anxiety about reaching Hannah was weighing sore 
upon him, for he called to me a bit testily, “I say, Alan ! 
What the devil did any man settle in a place like this for?” 

And then, when the last of the rude causeway was passed 
and there was opportunity for more words, though still 
small chance of going on more rapidly, he began to swear 
softly and soulfully, but I knew that every word came 
because of the goodness of his heart. Thpre was no evil 
in his expletives, but only the great vexation of being 
kept back from helping a woman who might be bleeding to 
death. 

At the next moment the moon was quite covered with 
clouds, and the blackness became so dense that we could 
not see even the heads of the horses, but were dimly con- 
scious only of great towering tree-trunks on either hand. 
The traveling thenceforth, however, was safer, since the 
horses had no longer to pick their way over logs but only 
to slough through the bog-holes, and so we went on, the 
silence, presently, broken only by the sound of their hoofs 
pulling from the mud, with a steady “sloop, sloop,” almost 
as though corks were being drawn from bottles. 

Once again we tried to urge the beasts to a canter, but 
soon found that was impossible, because of their stumbling, 
for wherever the holes were deepest poles and brush had 
been flung across, with little regard for midnight riders. 

“For the love of Heaven, Alan,” said the Doctor after 
a time, “have we got to go at this snail’s pace all the rest 
of the way? It’s a poor chance for Hannah if she’s badly 
cut.” 

And again: 

“So this is The Block. Alan, I’ve been a good Tory all 
my life, but if the Government’s to blame for things like 
this I’ll vote against ’em the next election, I will. It’s a 
dastardly shame! Think of a girl stuck behind a wall like 


1 1 4 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

this! And never a woman near her either! What’ll she 
do when the babies begin to come? The Lord help her!” 

And again: 

“How far have we to go yet, lad ? What time d’ye think 
it is now?” 

He was consumed with anxiety and so was I. 

Then a yelp broke out of the darkness ahead of us. 

“It’s Blucher,” I said. “I think we’re near now, sir.” 

“The Lord be praised!” said the Doctor, fervently, and 
never was better praise said or sung. 

At the spot where tHe bush gives way to the little clear- 
ing we met Jimmy with a lantern, come to see if there was 
sight of us. 

“Barry’s holdin’ the blood back,” said he, in answer to 
the Doctor’s quick questioning. “She’d lost a lot before. 
I’m powerful glad ye’re here, sir.” 

But before he had ended the Doctor had shot ahead on 
a gallop. 

I dismounted as quickly as I could for Blucher jumping 
frantically at my legs and face in joy at seeing me, and 
Jimmy and I followed. 

“Yer father’s jist got here,” said Jimmy, “an’ Mis’ Jones 
is here too. But if it hadn’t been fer Barry it ’ud been a 
poor chanst fer Hannah.” 

He was striding ahead, and without another word went 
into the house. When the light fell on him I saw his face 
white with agony. 

My father was sitting beside the fire-place, in which logs 
were burning, with a kettle of steaming water over the 
coals, and I went and sat beside him. 

Jimmy had gone into the bedroom, and for a little there 
was silence in the house, except that Mistress Jones came 
out hurriedly from time to time, for jugs of cold and hot 
water. My father smoked his pipe quietly, gazing into the 
fire, but said never a word, nor did I, but sat wondering 
how it was faring with Hannah, and by what manner 
Barry had “held the blood back.” 


AN EXCITING NIGHT 


ii5 

After what seemed a long time voices arose in low tones 
behind the door, and presently it opened and Jimmy came 
out radiant, his face all smiles, but with tears running down 
his cheeks, — the Doctor following him with the light of a 
great joy in his eyes. 

“She’s good for fifty years yet, Jimmy,” he was saying. 
“All she wants now is plenty of sleep — and nourishment.” 

And then came out Barry and Mistress Jones, Barry 
smiling but whitefaced, with Mistress Jones’ arm about 
her. 

“Yes, Hannah’s all right now,” went on the Doctor, nod- 
ding cheerily to my father and me. “She’s just dropped 
off into a nice little sleep.” 

With that he turned and drew Barry to him. “She’s all 
right,” he repeated, “thanks to you all, but most of all to 
this brave little girl.” 

“Nonsense, Doctor!” argued Barry, smiling up at him. 
“I only did what any one of them would have done. It 
was really nothing much.” 

“Oh, no,” smiled the Doctor. “Of course, as a profes- 
sional man, I know it was nothing at all to sit three hours 
in a cramped position holding an artery. Bless my soul, 
girl, there isn’t one in a thousand would have known what 
to do!” 

“No more there isn’t,” broke in Mistress Jones, who was 
bustling about putting some milk to heat at the fire. “An’ 
jist look at the white cheeks of her, an’ the black rings 
around her eyes! The darlin’ lamb! Lie down there, 
darlin’, on the bunk, an’ I’ll hev’ a cup o’ hot milk fer ye 
in no time.” 

Barry persisted that she had only experimented until 
she found the spot on Hannah’s arm that would keep the 
blood back, that she really was not very tired, and that she 
did not need a rest; but the Doctor over-ruled her and 
put her down among Hannah’s cushions, covering her with 
a shawl. 

Then it was that Jimmy found his voice. 

Going over to her, he laid his big hand on her head. 


ii 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


“God bless ye, little girl, fer this night’s work!” he said, 
husky with emotion. 

Barry tried to speak to him, but could not, and, covering 
her face with her hands, became shaken with quiet sobbing, 
while Jimmy’s tears dropped upon the pillow, almost min- 
gling with hers. Mistress Jones put down her jug of milk 
on the table and ran out of the house into the darkness. 
My father went over and stood at the little front window, 
with his back to us, while I stood there with a lump in my 
throat, and the Doctor hemmed and rubbed his nose with 
a red handkerchief. 

Thus did the reaction from the night’s strain come upon 
us. 

The Doctor first came to himself. 

“Tut! Tut!” he said, coughing a little. “All’s fine as a 
fiddle!” 

But Jimmy knelt down by Barry, with the tears still wet 
on his cheeks. 

“Ye’re a brave girl, Barry,” he said. “But ’twas the Lord 
sent ye.” And then, to the surprise of us all, he — our 
swearing, light-hearted Jimmy, recited very solemnly, look- 
ing up to the little window above as though to find the 
Almighty in the great sky beyond : 

“ ‘Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble , and 
he saved them out of their distresses. 

“‘He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of 
death, and brake their bands in sunder. 

“ ‘Oh that men would praise the Lord for His good- 
ness' ” 

When he ended we were all standing with bowed heads, 
my father still by the window; and Mistress Jones in the 
open doorway, wiping her eyes ; and then Jimmy arose, with 
the dignity of a great manliness upon him, and went to the 
Doctor, thanking him also, to which the Doctor responded : 

“Tut, Tut, man ! My business, man ! Glad Hannah came 
through, though ! Fine girl, that girl of yours !” 


AN EXCITING NIGHT 117 

After that Jimmy came to my father and me with his 
thanks, but I declare I could find nothing better to say 
than 

“And Billy, too.” 

“Fer sure an’ certain, — Billy, too,” smiled Jimmy, and 
then we all laughed and the tension was broken, and Mis- 
tress Jones was able to speak again. 

“Here, Alan, give Barry this drink o’ milk,” said she, 
giving me a welcome task. “An’ sit down every one o’ ye,, 
an’ I’ll git a cup o’ tea. Jimmy, lad, ye’re needin’ it, sure. 
An’ every one o’ yez, fer that matter. . . . Barry, love, 
drink up the milk, like an angel, an’ then try to sleep a 
bit.” 

So she bustled about, putting bread and butter on the 
table, and making the tea. 

Before we sat down to it the talking stopped while 
Jimmy slipped in to see if Hannah were still sleeping, and 
when he came out, closing the door very quietly, our 
tongues were loosed again. 

Over the cups the whole story was told, of how Jimmy 
had tried to bandage up the wound and had then set off, 
running, for the tavern; of how he had met Mistress Jones 
on the way back and she had turned with him, and of the 
long, long minutes before Barry arrived and my father. 

“The very idea of that girl inventing a tourniquet!” - 
chuckled the Doctor. “She’d twisted a bandage about in 
the very right spot, then, because it wasn’t tight enough, 
used her own hands for pressure.” But Barry was breath- 
ing deeply in a light sleep and did not hear a word that 
he said. 

Then, while we still sat at the table waiting for the 
day, the talk drifted off to other things, and there was 
much to say about the “Declaration” which Mackenzie 
has drawn up and which was published in full on August 
2nd, with the names of the Committee who signed it, in 
The Correspondent and Advocate , and in The Constitution. 

With Mackenzie the Doctor was not disposed to be 


1 1 8 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

lenient, waxing almost wrathy at the little man’s misde- 
meanors according to the Tory decalogue. 

“He’s going altogether too far,” he argued. “No doubt 
he thinks himself a second George Washington — with his 
Declaration — ‘Declaration of Independence/ by George ! 
He’ll be calling on the Province next thing to cut loose al- 
together.” 

To all of which, my father, being no radical, did not 
greatly disagree. 

But Jimmy sat watching the Doctor with burning eyes, 
and presently he said: 

“I can’t argify with you, Doctor, fer I don’t know all the 
ins an’ outs of it, but I know this — that if Hannah had died 
this night she’d ha’ been murdered by a Gover’ment that’s 
all fer itself an’ none fer the people. What’s Gover’ments 
fer, if it isn’t to help the men that wants to work, an’ take 
care o’ the wimmen an’ children? An’, they say, there’s lots 
more o’ troubles as bad as the blocks o’ land all over the 
country that’s kept fer men that don’t need them, an’ a 
curse to the wimmen an’ children. Not as I’m complainin’ 
much fer me an’ Hannah. So fur v^e’ve been happy as 
larks, workin’ from four in the mornin’ to ten at night. 
But when I wus runnin’ out over the cord-roy, with Han- 
nah bleedin’ at home, I cudn’t help thinkin’ how it ’ud ha’ 
been if it had been winter. I’d ha’ managed myself on the 
snow-shoes, but what about the Doctor? An’ then J 
thought o’ poor Rowley Ewart, an’ how he got home on 
the snow-shoes an’ found his wife an’ a little baby both 
dead; an’ I knowed then why the folks behind the blocks 
is jist fair scared o’ the winter. Seein’ Hannah all the time 
I kep’ sayin’ over an’ over the Promises in The Book in 
my mind, them verses my mother learnt me when I wus 
a wee lad, but somehow I cudn’t help thinkin’ o’ Rowley’s 
wife, an’ I cudn’t make things fit nowhow. I knowed that 
sometimes prayers is answered — as 'they wus with Hannah. 
But I cudn’t help thinkin’ o’ Rowley’s wife. ’Pears to me 
sir, as if sometimes the ill acts o’ men crosses even the will 
o’ the Almighty. An’, sir, savin’ yer presence, it ’pears to 


AN EXCITING NIGHT 


119 

me we’ve no right Gover’ment or it ’ud look out better 
fer the wimmen an’ the little children.” 

There was a long silence after Jimmie stopped speak- 
ing. I think we were all speechless from astonishment at 
this night’s revelation of him, and, besides, there was so 
little that could be said. 

My father puffed hard at his pipe, and the Doctor, at 
the end of the table, thrust his hands far into his pockets 
and stared at his plate, the wrinkles deep between his eyes. 
When he spoke at last it was but to mutter, more to him- 
self than to us : 

“Yes, always it’s the women and the children!” 

Mistress Jones, we hear, went home with Barry, and has 
kept her in bed ever since. 

And now I do regret every thought I ever had against 
her, for I perceive that the exterior of a person can by no 
means be taken as an index of the heart, and that some 
little faults of babbling may easily be overshadowed by a 
great kindness that shows itself in time of trouble. This 
my mother has always told me. 


CHAPTER XII 


FATEFUL WORDS 

S UNDAY, a very fine day, and I am not at all sorry 
for the chance to rest, for there has been much heavy 
work with the harvest. 

Notwithstanding that, and in spite of the fact that ordi- 
narily at this time of year we farm folk could not be 
dragged or coaxed from our land, going to bed with the 
birds — and getting up with them, too, by my faith ! — we 
have had some diversion, of late, that has kept us abroad 
when we should have been sleeping and has left us in 
sorry enough mood, at times, for being early at the wheat. 

Again there have been meetings in the mill, with The 
Schoolmaster as chief spokesman ; and a picturesque 
enough figure he has been, standing before us, with the 
candle light flickering on him, and his eyes flashing, and 
the wisps of long black hair falling over his forehead. He 
is very tall and thin, with a long pale face and sharply- 
defined features, and when he speaks he uses many ges- 
tures — quite unconsciously, too — and turns to this side and 
that, leaning towards us and extending his long, bony arm 
with a pointing index finger towards us when he would 
impress an idea. 

I wonder if everyone has the sensation, at times, of a 
certain strangeness in things, as though one were only a 
visitor to the time and the place. Or, at others, of a 
strange familiarity, as though one had been in the self- 
same spot and heard the selfsame words before. 

I think such a mood came upon me the other night in 
the mill. As usual, Hank and I sat at the back on our 
box, which gives us a good view of the proceedings and of 

120 


FATEFUL WORDS 


121 


the men, older than we for the most part, who come to the 
meetings. The windows were covered and the doors 
closed as usual, for The Schoolmaster insists on every pre- 
caution against discovery, so the light lost itself on the 
way to the ceiling, dissolving above us in what seemed a 
vast arch of gloom. Between us and the table, the men on 
the benches appeared like moving silhouettes of darkness, 
and everywhere about the floor and walls were long black 
shadows, shifting as the men moved about, or immovable 
from the vats and beams ; while before us The Schoolmaster 
in his black clothes, with the light fair on his face, spoke 
impassioned words, turning from side to side and raising 
his long arms, the flash of his eyes coming and going with 
the emotion of the thought that impelled, him. 

Very suddenly I lost all consciousness of what he was 
saying, and felt as though I were looking on some strange 
weird picture or vision from the past, of sharp lights and 
black shadows and dim nuances running off into immensity ; 
and the feeling came to me that these men before us were 
not of our little Here and Now, but part of some great 
Urge that always had been and always would be while 
there was aught to right in all the Universe. 

Perhaps it was a weirdness in The Schoolmasters ora- 
tory that induced the mood, for Hank must have been 
experiencing some such wave of emotion too. 

“Ugh ! I feel as though I were in some pirates’ cave or 
something,” he whispered to me, breaking my spell; but 
almost before the words were said corrected himself — “No, 
but at a hidden gathering of the old Covenanters.” Hank’s 
ancestors were of that brave and rigid old sect in Scotland, 
and many an hour has he beguiled for me, in our haunts by 
the river, by telling me tales of them which have been 
carried down by word of mouth from generation to gen- 
eration. 

When we told The Schoolmaster, later, about our fancies, 
he said: 

“Yes, Alan, I think you were right. For a moment, lad, 
you caught something that belongs to the Universe and 


122 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

to all Time. Those men, you, Hank here, I, everyone who 
is alive, must be a part of the great Urge forward. Should 
we fail that, we are but withered stalks that have borne 
no seed ; we have failed in the task the Plan for All Things 
set us here to do.” 

I have never heard an orator that even our new world 
here calls great, but it seems to me sometimes that were 
The Schoolmaster in the places where men throng and 
world-events are done, he must surely be no insignificant 
figure. He can, at least, thrill one with his voice, and 
fire one with his spirit, and I am quite sure that were it 
not for my father’s calm counsels I might be carried off 
my feet by him, as is Hank. And yet I have felt, at times, 
as I have seen Hank’s face kindle and his cheeks flush and 
his eyes shine when he speaks of The Schoolmaster and 
his principles and mission, that I am missing something. 
It would be fine to be always enthusiastic and to go all 
the way without pausing to consider whether things are 
“thus and so.” 

The Schoolmaster, my father says, has fine ideals, and 
burns with the fire of which poets and martyrs and saints 
are made; but he is likely, so my father thinks, to see but 
one side of a question, and to act without waiting to grasp 
the true balance of things. 

In the meetings in the mill he speaks, of course, wholly 
of the political situation, and of our grievances, and of 
what this Upper Canada might be were the men who hold 
her destinies in their hands, anxious to help her people 
rather than to wax rich on the fat of the land themselves. 
Our Governors, he says, and all those who cling about 
theui — or make tools of them — refuse to believe that the 
people are discontented, because they themselves do not 
share in that discontent, but spend their lives chiefly in 
pleasure-getting, paid for by money which they have not 
earned. 

“But, mark you,” he says, “someone earns that money. 
There is nothing spent that is not earned,” — which seems 
to me very reasonable, as is also his contention that the 


FATEFUL WORDS 


123 

men and women who work hardest and most honestly 
should have the greatest rewards from their labor. 

“Sir Peregrine Maitland kept his eyes blind to the needs 
of the people/’ he thunders, “Sir John Colborne would not 
see, Sir Francis Bond Head will not see. Eyes have they 
but they will not see ; ears have they but ttfey will not hear ; 
hearts have they but they will not feel! What are the 
people to them but beasts of burden? hewers of wood and 
carriers of water to keep them in ease and luxury?” 

And then he goes on in sharper words to upbraid the 
doings of those more of our own people, who should feel 
sympathy for us but do not. 

He has told us much which we did not know before of 
the Union Meetings which Mackenzie has been holding 
“for political organization,” chiefly in North York and 
Simcoe, where, it appears, — and especially about Holland 
Landing — men named Lount, Lloyd, Gibson, Gorham, and 
others, most of them farmers, have given him ear and 
are lending him every assistance in their power. 

To the question raised at our last assemblage as to 
whether Mackenzie meditates actual rebellion, The School- 
master said he thought not, but that a demonstration might 
be necessary to secure reforms. 

With that Hank’s father got up and drew a paper from 
his pocket. “But what do you think of this?” he said, 
finding the place with some difficulty, in the flickering light. 
“Men, this is a copy of The Constitution, published on 
July the fifth. In it I find the words, and presumably 
William Lyon Mackenzie was the author of them” — and 
then he read a paragraph, laying great stress upon each 
word of the closing sentence : “ Will — Canadians declare 
— their independence — and shoulder — their muskets ?’ ” 

But The Schoolmaster waved the matter aside. 

“All a part of the demonstration,” he said, shortly. “All 
a part of the demonstration. Delegations enough have 
gone up empty-handed, Heaven knows! What has their 
reception been? — Politeness, gentlemen, politeness. Have 
you forgotten how the deputation of nine hundred men that 


124 THE forging of the pikes 

went up to the Lieut.-Governor in 1832 was satisfied? — «■ 
‘Gentlemen/ said Sir John Colborne, ‘I have received the 
petition of the inhabitants/ . . . That has been the history 
of our deputations, and will be the history of them unless 
they can make some show of force. This Sir Francis Bond 
Head laughs at our delegations, gentlemen — laughs at 
them! A social personage, a wine-bibber of the nineteenth 
century, gentlemen ; what does he care for the people of 
Upper Canada? Here today, gone tomorrow! No sense 
of responsibility to the world! Alas, gentlemen, our 
‘Tried Reformer’ has proved but a peacock and a pleasure 
seeker. What will he do better than the Governors of the 
past? — But if our men go up armed, then perchance he 
will listen.” 

And then Red Jock sprang to his feet. 

“Is it laffin’ at us they are the noo?” he said, shaking 
his fist. “Gie us the airms, as ye say, sir, an’ mebbe they’ll 
laff on the ither side o’ their faces! — Oh aye, sir, it’s been 
politeness an’ politeness,’ an’ ‘We’ll tak’ it into oor seerious 
conseederation,’ but politeness’ll no fill hungry wames or 
hungry herts, an’ takin’ things into seerious conseederation 
gives a braw chance fer long waitin’.” 

“Not that we may have to use the arms, Jock,” said The 
Schoolmaster. 

— And then he went on to speak of the growth of the 
soul that comes of self sacrifice, and to tell in illustration 
the story of Garibaldi, and Kosciusko, and Arnold von 
Winkelried, the Swiss patriot, who in the great battle of 
Sempach, when the Swiss had failed to break the ranks 
of the Austrian Knights, rushed forward to the enemy and 
gathered a number of their spears together to his breast 
so that over his dead body his comrades rushed on to 
victory and freedom. 

I do know this, that at the end of his speaking my 
courage burned high, and I know that as we walked out 
into the night my eyes must have shone with the lights 
that come into Hank’s when tales of valorous and unselfish 
deeds are told. 


FATEFUL WORDS 125 

Much would it have suited us — Hank and me — to have 
gone home with The Schoolmaster and heard him talk until 
dawn, as he is prone enough to do when his emotions are 
on fire; but it was two of the clock, and my father was 
waiting for me to take the short cut home. 

“Well, what did you think of it all?” I asked him. 

“He’s right — -right enough in some respects — Aye,” re- 
plied he. “But I don’t like this talk of arming. It’s — 
well, ominous.” 

“But he says it’s merely for demonstration,” I said, 
reflecting even as I spoke upon a growing conviction within 
me that The Schoolmaster is not yet wholly clear in regard 
to his own attitude. 

“And in the next breath told of men who have carried 
demonstration to bloodshed,” said my father. “I tell you 
when men begin to talk about arms it’s but a step to using 
them — Aye. I’m not saying The Schoolmaster himself 
thinks he’s going to fight, or any of us, but the notion’s 
lodged back of his brain somewhere, and’ll come to the 
top some day. Between him and Mackenzie and the like 
of them a fine bundle of tinder is being made ready. Some 
day the match’ll be set to it — Aye! — I’m not liking the 
whole business.” 

“But,” I argued, reciting, perhaps unconsciously, words 
of The Schoolmaster, “the world has always gone ahead 
through shedding of blood. Why should we save our 
bodies when the world’s need demands that we give them 
up ?” 

“That’s all right, lad,” returned my father. “All right 
and good when nothing else will meet the need. But right 
here and now maybe the thing’s to wait a bit. I’ve a mind 
that there are good men enough in this new land to bring 
justice, without men that are just neighbors having to 
blow one another’s heads off for it.” 

“But, father, The Schoolmaster thinks we’ve already 
waited over long,” I begpn, but my father spoke on as 
though he had not heard me. 

“I’m thinking of the women and children,” he said. “If 


126 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


wee Mac churns up a rebellion — that amounts to anything 
— there’ll be more to follow than the women and children 
can bear — aye. What can women do in a new bush coun- 
try like this?” 

“War’s never a holiday,” I held. “It’s all suffering. 
But when one’s on the right side the end makes the suffer- 
ing worth while, doesn’t it?” 

My father stopped to light his pipe, and then we trudged 
on in silence for a bit, and I looked up to the sky, all 
clear and soft in the summer night, and saw the tree tops 
waving softly against it, by the side of the road where we 
walked. And I heard their murmuring, and smelled the 
sweet odors from the wood, and suddenly it came to me 
that all this talk of fighting was a jarring note upon the 
great peace of the green world. It brought back to me 
one day in May when I had gone over green fields and 
among green leaving woods, besprinkled, here and there, 
with the pink blossoms of the wild apple. My very spirit 
had been singing, when suddenly I came upon a poor cow 
stark and stiff, and all crumpled in a terrible death. Fallen 
over a huge log which, apparently, she had attempted to 
jump, she had become entangled and impaled on the up- 
turned roots of a fallen tree, and had perished miserably. 
Then it seemed to me that Death — such death — was a jar- 
ring note in the green and beautiful world, and so it came 
to me now. Yet, surely, Principle must ride gloriously 
even through Death and Discord. And so, I knew, my 
father felt, for he had been a soldier and had not failed 
to win his honors, either, and that at Waterloo. 

“Lad,” said he, presently, “I like to hear you talk that 
way. And mind, I’m not arguing against war; until the 
world’s a deal better than it is there may be times when 
nothing else will count — though I’m thinking it’s oftenest 
brought on by men all agog for profit or glory. . . . But 
for this tempest in a teacup that’s boiling up here, I’m not 
for it. What can a hantle of farmers do with arms? 
j They’ll be mown down like thistles, and the women left 


FATEFUL WORDS 127 

to face the winter with neither men nor money. The 
forest’s a cruel place in the deep winter — aye. And, Alan, 
lad, war’s a cruel deed — at the best o’ times. . . . I’m 
thinking, too, that wee Mac’s on for a separation from the 
Old Land, and I’m not for that. But I’m not for the way 
things are going on, either. They’re bad, Alan, — damn 
bad ! But as I see it we ought to have patience a bit longer 
and see what’ll come out of it. Rolph’s up there near the 
heart of things — and Baldwin, and Bidwell, and Morrison. 
The people are increasing in numbers, too, and some day 
they’ll be strong enough to get their rights without all this 
pother.” 

“The Schoolmaster thinks not,” said I. “He thinks 
things’ll go from worse to worse.” 

“Well, maybe he’s right,” assented my father. “But 
he’s a dyed-in-the-wool Radical, and inclined to take the 
extreme, always. People can’t help being born like that, 
Alan. Maybe all the real reformers have been like that. 
Nevertheless, I’m convinced this talk of rebellion in Upper 
Canada’s a mistake, — aye. And I’m going to no more of 
the meetings.” 

“Do you wish me not ” I began, but my father waved 

an impatient hand. 

“You’re a man now, Alan,” he said. “You must make 
your own decisions.” 

He had talked more than his wont, and I could see that 
he considered our talk leading to nowhere and wished it 
ended, and so we trudged on in silence the rest of the way. 

As I write here under the tree by the door, with my 
paper on a board on my knee, I pause to look about. The 
sunshine is lying very still and rich on the shorn fields and 
on the knees. Above the fence of the little paddock by 
the barn it shines on my mother’s brown hair as she comes 
back with some new-laid eggs for supper. Beyond I can 
see the deep cool shades of the Golden-Winged Woods. 
They lure me, and I think that 


128 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


Continued on the night of 
August 14th. 

My journal broke off very abruptly yesterday afternoon, 
and all because of a bird-song that came to me, of a sud- 
den, very faintly over the stubble-fields, from the Golden- 
Winged Woods: 



Almost it startled me, for the birds, even the white- 
throats, are singing but little of late, having stopped, as 
they do, when the love-making is over and the young fam- 
ilies of nestlings are abroad on their own account. 

I sat with raised pen listening, but when the song was 
repeated again and again, at regular intervals, both pen 
and book were quickly enough put away, and in a moment 
I was striding across the fields and plunging into the cool 
shade which had at first called to me, — or was it the 
presence of Barry that had called to me through the shim- 
mering heat-waves over the golden stubble? 

Almost at the rim of the woods I found her. She was 
sitting on a log, very quietly, watching for me. She had 
donned her buckskin-colored gown and red sash, and her 
hair was loose over her shoulders, all this startling, yet 
pleasing me, too, for she has looked melancholy in the 
mourning which she has worn since her mother’s death. 

She smiled slightly, as I came to her, and motioned me 
to sit on the bank near her feet. 

“We’ll stay here,” she said. “I want to stay where i 
can look across at your home. I’ve been watching your 
mother, Alan. I’m very fond of her.” 

“Would you like to go over?” I asked. 

But she raised her hands in some confusion, looking 
down at her garb. 

“She mightn’t understand, Alan,” she said, “or someone 
might come in who would not understand. . . . It — it isn’t 
disrespect. But I got so weary of the clothing of sadness. 
Alan, I don’t think anyone should ever wear mourning. 


FATEFUL WORDS 


1I9 

It helps to keep us looking down — down at the dark and 
sad things. We ought to try to look up, always, don’t you 
think? — seeking for the bright things. Don’t you think if 
life means anything it means that there must be brightness 
— always — at the end?” 

'‘I like to hope so,” I assented. 

“The Schoolmaster’s little sermon — that you told me, you 
remember — helped me to see that,” she went on. “And 
today the mood came to me to throw away the sad, black 
things and dress for the woods. I had to keep to the 
woods, too, all the way so no one would see me.” 

“I’ve had so little of you, for so long, Barry,” I said. 

“I’ve missed you,” she replied, simply, and the words 
went to my head like wine. 

“Then,” I exclaimed, “why didn’t you call me sooner?” 

“Because,” she began, confused again, as I had never 

before seen her, “Because — oh, there are too many 

becauses! Besides, I’ve been poor company. It’s all been 
so cheerless and gloomy — all,” she corrected herself, “but 
for one bright dream.” 

“Will you tell me that ?” I asked gently. 

But she drew herself away a little, very quickly. 

“Oh, no,” she said. “I cannot tell you that.” 

Then, with elbow on knee and chin in the cup of her 
hand, she became very pensive, and looked out for a long 
time across the shining field, forgetful, I think, of me, for 
her eyes were looking far away, into some realm into which 
I could not follow. 

Patiently I waited, and after a time she came back to 
the Golden-Winged Woods again. 

“I’ve had a strange life, Alan,” she said presently, and 
I listened almost breathlessly, for never before had she 
spoken to me of her past, except of her three-days’ adven- 
ture with the Indians, when a child. And yet her past 
mattered nothing whatever to me, for was she not Barry? 

“And yet,” she went on, “it has been very much the same 
thing — always roaming about from one inn to another, 
keeping away from the towns. It has only been stratjge 


I 3 0 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

because the tavern life has been foreign to me, aways. 
I’ve hated it, Alan, — just hated it, — and I don’t think my 
mother loved it either.” 

Again she paused, and looked far out over the stubble, 
and between her eyes came a little wrinkle as though she 
had drawn it there in pain or perplexity. 

“I don’t think it’s wrong to tell you this, Alan,” she 
went on, after a little. “I have never told anyone — and 
sometimes — sometimes, you know, one just has to tell 
someone things. Most people have some relative, some 
friend. I have no one — at least no one to whom I can 
open my heart, but you.” 

And then I raised her red scarf and touched it to my 
lips, at which she smiled — a wistful little smile. 

“ I want to tell you just a little — about us,” she continued, 
“then if ever you hear things, you will, perhaps, under- 
stand.” 

“I don’t need to understand! I accept you just as you 
are, Barry !” I exclaimed, for which she thanked me. 

“But I want to tell you,” she said. And then, quick as 
the wind, she changed her mind. “No, I will not tell you,” 
she said. “After all, the past belongs to those who lived 
in it. And, too, there was so little that I understood. 
Only this I know, Alan — that money alone never satisfied 
any human heart; that we may hide, but not from our- 
selves; and that it takes a great love — for someone — per- 
haps for some work — to make life worth while.” 

The words, it may be, sounded like an invitation to a 
lover’s declaration, but there was that in the look and the 
tone that told me that Barry was again slipping away from 
me. In the very agony of knowing that I arose, and sat 
beside her, and caught her in my arms, and the words that 
I said I do not know, nor, if I did, would I confide them 
even to this my journal, for so sacred were they that I 
think they are held somewhere in the Universe and will one 
day come back to me — and surely she will bring them 
and ask me to claim them with her. Surely such great 
love-speech cannot be lost, but must sometime find mark — 


FATEFUL WORDS 


131 

and then — yes, surely she will bring them back to me with 
her own love-words added to them. 

I know that I asked her to be my wife. But very gently 
and sweetly she repulsed me. 

“Alan, dear, dear friend, not now,” she said. “Don’t 
let us speak of this now. — I think you will forget me. You 
must forget me if you can.” And then the tears ran 
down her cheeks, and together we walked through the 
woods to her home. 

When we had almost reached it, she spoke. 

“Alan,” she said, “I’m sorry, so sorry ! You’ve been such 
a — boy — in some ways. I never knew that you could care 
like this. You must forget me, Alan. — You must! There 
will be someone better than I am for you.” 

But nowhere in all this world will there be one better 
than Barry for me. And so I shall try to be patient — 
and, some day, she will hear me. Yes, I swear it by the 
silver stars above me this night — some day, worthy of her, 
if I can make myself so, I will speak, — and then, perhaps, 
she will hear me. 

— Yet I am down-hearted, too, for who can tell whether 
these things can surely be? 


CHAPTER XIII 


AN AUTUMN AFTERNOON 


HIS afternoon I have spent with Red Jock. I went 



J- first to the tavern to see Barry, but she was nowhere 
to be found, but only a red-faced buxom damsel whom 
Mister Deveril has brought from Buffalo to help in the 
house, and who, by my faith, seems mightily at home. 
Barry had been gone all day, she said; she didn’t pretend 
to keep track of her, — supposed she was off somewhere in 
the woods as usual. 

And so I went on to the blacksmith shop, half hoping my 
girl might be there, for she dearly loves to drop in for 
a chat with the smith, especially of a Sunday, when he is 
not busy and has time to talk. 

But Jock was sitting alone under the tree in the yard, 
very clean and well-shaven, laboriously reading a news- 
paper, his lips moving to such good effect that before I 
reached him I could hear stentorian whispers. So ab- 
sorbed was he that he was dead to everything else, and 
I was close beside him before he was aware of me. 

“Hoots, mon !” he exclaimed, with evident pleasure. 
“Hoo are ye the day? Ah’m richt glad tae see ye. Sit 
doon an’ hae a bit crack.” 

So I threw my hat on the ground and stretched myself 
beside it, and we “cracked” about the weather, and the 
harvest, and all the doings of the neighborhood and the 
highway. 

But when I would have arisen to go home Jock would 
not hear of it. “Indeed an’ ye’ll no,” he said. “Ye’ll just 
bide an’ hae a bit supper wi’ me, an’ it’s unco’ welcome 
ye’ll be. The Sabbath’s a wearisome day — wi’ all respec’ 


AN AUTUMN AFTERNOON 133 

tae it, ye ken. Whan a mon’s at his wark the time gaes 
by like a burn, ripplin’ an’ laffin’ — or maybe a bit gray an’ 
glowerin’ gin he happens tae be oot o’ humor. But it’s 
on the rest days that it juist lags like the snaw in a late 
Springtime, an’ it’s then he maist needs wife an’ bairns tae 
keep him believin’ life’s worth livin’. But Ah’m thinkin’, 
though, ’at wark’s the best thing in life, mairret or single, 
an’ no the curse it’s been branded. If it wisna for’t we’d 
be a’ eatin’ ane another up like the beasties i’ the jungle, 
Ah doot.” 

“How is it you never married, Jock?” I asked. “A fine 
man like you shouldn’t have to be missing the wife and 
bairns.” 

He rubbed his chin for a minute, thoughtfully. 

“Weel,” he said, turning to me, with the twinkle in his 
eye that I had expected, “I juist escapit it.” 

“Just escaped it?” 

“Aye — By the skin o’ ma teeth,” he added, chortling 
with the remembrance. 

“Can you tell me about it, Jock?” I asked, feeling my 
way cautiously, for though Jock has a great “gift o’ the 
gab” he can be as dour and reserved as an Indian if the 
notion takes him. But this time he was expansive. 

“Oh, aye,” he replied, quite cheerfully. “Ye see the way 
o’t wis this : She wis a gey fine lassie, wi’ curls an’ dimples, 
an’ a glint to her ee fit tae send a lad daft, — ah’ a way o’ 
turnin’ her shoulther, an’ settin’ oot her bit foot, fer a’ 
the warl’ like Tam Tamson’s filly. — Ye ken what a bonnie 
bit o’ horseflesh is that, Alan?” 

I nodded, and he went on with enthusiasm. “Oh, aye! 
That’ll be a bonnie leddy, ane o’ these days! Slim an’ 
prood, wi’ her heid up, an’ fetlocks as trim as yer wrist! 
Steppin’ an’ prancin’ aboot ! It’ll be a fearsome time Ah’ll 
hae wi’ her when it comes to the shoein’, Ah doot. Tam 
Tamson tauld me ” 

“But you’re getting away from the story, Jock,” I in- 
terrupted, and that brought him back. 

“Hech, mon, ye’re unco’ keen tae hear o’ the lassies !” he 


i 3 4 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

laughed. — “Weel, as Ah wis saying she wis eneuch to send 
ony lad aff, an’ Ah wis daffie eneuch an’ no mistake, but 
juist aboot thae time my sister gaed awa’ — she wis keepin’ 
the hoose, ye ken — an’ the lassie’s mither gied me an invi- 
tation tae bide wi’ the family till she cam’ back. . . . Weel, 
it didna’ tak’ me a day tae mak’ up my min’ aboot that, 
so ower Ah gaed wi’ my bit travelin’ bag an’ my plaidie, an’ 
fer a week or mair all gaed fine as a fiddle. . . . But Alan, 
afore lang Ah began tae get a glint that there’s mair tae luik 
tae in a wumman than a dimple, or a toss o’ her heid, though 
Ah’m no sae sure, Alan, that ye ever ken a’ there’s tae be 
borne wi’ i’ the buddies till ye live i’ the hoose wi’ them. 
Afore the second week wis weel afoot, it cam’ tae me like a 
flash ae day, that conversation’s a braw thing tae conseeder. 
Wi’ Kirsty the clack frae morn till nicht wis : ‘Oo ! There’s 
Mary MacDonal’ gangin’ doon the road! Noo, what d’ye 
say’s taen her oot this time o’ day? I’ll be thinkin’ she’ll 
be ower to Ellen Cameron’s to sew. She’s wearin’ a new 
cape an’ a red petticoat. . . . Oo ! D’ye see Mary For- 
sythe an’ Jim’s Jimmie doon ayont the river? They’ll be 
fer the glen. I wunner if they’ll be mairrit this June. 
Unco’ fine she is wi’ her new bunnit. It’s purple, wi’ pink 
roses on’t!’ . . . An’ when she wisna’ keekin’ oot o’ the 
window she wis aye makin’ bits o’ lace an’ sic fule things, 
an’ tellin’ ye hoo mony steeks it tuik here, an’ hoo mony ye 
had to miss there, an’ the Lord kens what-an’-all. . . . 
Afore the second week wis weel afoot, it cam to me wi’ a 
flash, as Ah remarked afore. There wis an auld aunt that 
lived i’ the hoose. ‘Deil take it,’ Ah said to mysel’, 'it’s 
no Kirsty Ah’m fain tae hear talkin’ but the auld aunt.’ — 
Ah’m thinkin’ it’s aften juist that, Alan. — A callant thinks 
it the lassie he’s taen wi’, when it’s naught but a dimple or 
a ringlet — wi’ a’ the family fer a backgroond as ye may 
say. — Sae that brocht an end on’t. Ah thocht o’ a’ the 
years an’ years listenin’ to thae clashin’ aboot this ane’s 
kirtle an’ that ane’s bunnit, an’ whether wee Andy wis to 
mairry big Meg, an’ aboot the wee bit steeks. ‘Ah’ll no 
worry thro’ it,’ Ah said to mysel’. ‘Ah’d be daft wi’ a 


AN AUTUMN AFTERNOON 135 

year o’t.’ An* it didna’ tak’ me lang to kick ower the 
traces aifter that. ... Ah escapit, Alan, but if it hadna’ 
been fer the bit stay i’ the hoose wi’ the limmer Ah doot 
Ah’d ha’ taken the step. — The Lord be thankit fer His 
mercies !” 

“But what about the poor girl, Jock?” I asked. “Didn't 
she feel badly?” 

Jock had no regrets. 

“Hoots, mon,” he said, “thae bit lassies wi' the glint i’ 
their een an' the bit tricks wi' the shouthers an’ ankles is 
no worrit lang. There’s aye guid feeshin’, they ay haud. 
An’ moreover, Alan, Ah wis a real airtist, as ye may say. 
Ah didna’ up an’ tell the lassie what Ah wis aifter, an’ 
set her greetin’ an’ clackin’ aboot it. Ah juist brocht 
anither laddie an’ left him wi’ her, gently an’ naterally ye 
ken, an’ afore twa wriggles o’ a lamb’s tail she wis juist as 
much taen up wi’ him. That gied me the bit atween my 
teeth, an’ sae it wis a’ ended ‘in sweet accord,’ as the 
Methody hymn pits it.” 

“You were an ‘artist’ surely enough, Jock,” I said, laugh- 
ing, “but it’s not so very nice to live alone as you do. 
Besides, Jock, a man like you, with a good trade, ought to 
have a family in a new country like this.” 

Jock did not reply for a moment, but sat looking off 
into the deep shadows of the woods beyond the road, where 
the maple trees were already showing an odd blaze of 
scarlet and the beeches a shimmer of pale gold. 

“Ah’ve no spoken o’t afore, Alan,” he said presently, 
“tae ony leevin’ soul. But Ah’ve no negleckit ma dooty 
a’thegither. There wis twa weans i’ the Auld Kintra, wha 
wis left wi’ ne’er a frien’ in a’ the warl’. Ah promised 
their faither Ah’d tak’ care o’ them. They’re in Toronto 
wi’ a guid wumman wha keeps them as clean an’ bonnie as 
daisies an’ sends them tae the schule. She’s fain eneuch 
tae get the bit siller fer their keep, puir buddy, an’ she 
makes a guid home fer the weans.” 

Again he paused and looked into the woods, then he 
resumed : 


1 36 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“Ah dinna min’ tellin’ ye, Alan, that Ah’d mairry her the 
morrow gin she’d tak’ me. She’s a winsome lass, an’ no 
fashin’ hersel’ ower bit steeks an’ ither fowk’s business. 
But her hert’s sore yet ower him that’s gaed ate’. Ah 
doot if ay she’ll luik at big Red Jock.” 

“Are you very fond of her, Jock?” I asked. 

“Noo ye’ve said it,” he replied. “Alan, she’s tae me 
what Barry is tae you, gin Ah ken the signs. — Aye, Alan, 
but she’s the dainty lass! The wee han’s of her, like the 
hawthorn buds i’ the spring! An’ the saft voice of her, 
like the win’s soughin’ up there i’ the pine trees ! An’ the 
big gray een luikin’ up like stars frae her widow’s bunnet ! — - 
Ah doot, Alan, she’s ower fine fer me.” 

— So it was that I learned that even Red Jock cherishes 
his romance. 

“What is her name?” I asked, and he said, “Eleeza- 
beth.” 

Then the talk drifted off to other things. 

In his little shop on the highroad Jock is in the very 
stream of folk going to and fro, and hears much that never 
comes to us out in the fields, and so he usually has many 
things of interest to tell if he chooses to tell them. This 
afternoon, as was to be expected from these times, he fell 
naturally into the talk that makes up so much of our con- 
versation, often stormily when Reformer and Tory meet, 
and he had something to tell me of the gatherings which 
Mackenzie and his followers are now holding in various 
places, ever more boldly, very little attempt being made 
to conceal their occasion or their purport, sometimes even 
with defiant mottoes posted on the walls. Always resolu- 
tions are passed in the most daring way, but with very 
little interference, the Tories choosing, for the most part, 
to treat such demonstrations with contempt and ridicule. 
Invariably, of course, the Radicals are in attendance, but 
the more moderate Reformers take no part, or stay away 
altogether. Nevertheless, there is much bitterness being 
stirred up in the country, and even the moderate Reformers 


AN AUTUMN AFTERNOON 137 

have to face misunderstanding and obloquy because of 
these things. With their attitude Jock is not in sympathy. 
They are neither one thing nor another, he says, and that 
is not according to his philosophy of life. “It’s ay them 
that gangs a’ the way that gets there,” he says. A good 
friend or a bitter enemy is Jock. 

And then as we talked, while the sun sank in the West 
and the shadows lengthened across the road, there sounded 
the galloping of a horse’s hoofs, drawing rapidly nearer, 
and in a moment from behind the big beech tree at the 
edge of the yard came full tilt none other than The School- 
master. 

His face lighted up when he saw us, and, swerving his 
horse in, he drew rein and flung himself off, then fastened 
the horse to the hitching post and sat down on a bench 
before us. 

He was very warm from long and hard riding, and the 
long black hanks of hair lay wet on his forehead, but he 
did not show any consciousness of bodily discomfort other 
that to remove his hat and throw it on the grass. He is 
always oblivious of himself when at all excited, and, in- 
deed, this time it did not require more than a second glance 
to see that he was under some unusual mental strain or 
exaltation. 

“I’ve just come from Toronto,” he said, almost imme- 
diately, and then, he went on to tell us, in a few words, 
of things he had heard there and in the vicinity. Lount, 
Gibson and Nelson Gorham, he said, are all helping Mac- 
kenzie, and speaking at the meetings, their words carrying 
great weight, for they are all known as fine men and are 
proving themselves orators besides. In the West, too, the 
people are aroused, and are under the direction of one Doc- 
tor Duncombe. So that Mackenzie’s plan of dividing the 
Province into four parts, for organization, is so far work- 
ing splendidly. ... With the Lower Province, too, it ap- 
pears, there is to be some cooperation, and Jesse Lloyd, 
of Lloydtown, has been appointed as emissary between 
Mackenzie and Papineau, going to and fro between the 


138 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

Provinces, carrying letters and messages that can be en- 
trusted only by word of mouth. This, however, came to 
The Schoolmaster by devious ways, and is not publicly 
known, so that it behooves me to be very silent on the 
matter. As for Jock, with all his talking he could be 
burned to ashes at his own forge before he would divulge 
anything entrusted to him. Besides he is a Radical and 
fever hot for the cause. 

“Ye'll be sayin’ noo that they’ll be for fechtin’?” he 
“speired,” when The Schoolmaster paused in his recital. 

“I’m not prepared to say that,” replied The Schoolmaster. 
“But we must be ready. If all else fails, even to fight, 
regrettable though that may be, may be necessary.” 

“Noo, ye’re sayin’ it!” exclaimed Jock, enthusiastically. 

“ — And in order that our men may be ready in case of 
such an emergency,” continued The Schoolmaster, “they 
must be trained. — And you,” turning directly to Red Jock — 
“can help more than most of us.” 

“Me, sir?” 

“Yes, you, Jock. You are in a position to do so.” 

Jock continued to stare for a moment, then, with what 
may have been intended for a bow of acquiescence, “Ah’ll 
be fair complimented, sir, — gin ye’ll tell me ma bit job.” 

The Schoolmaster waved his hand. 

“I’ll drop in to see you on a week day,” he said. 
“There’s much that you can do, Jock. As for the rest of 
us, we’ve been all over slow, I fear. Already they’re be- 
ginning to drill ” 

“To drill!” we both exclaimed. 

“Yes, to drill, in many places, and for the sake of the 
rifle practice, pigeon and turkey matches are becoming very 
popular. Don’t say no if you are invited to one in the 
Village or down at the Corners before long. — As for the 
drilling, I’ve been thinking that Jimmie Scott’s is just the 
place. — A bit of irony that, isn’t it ? — that The Block should 
be the very rampart for a movement against the condition 
that made it possible ! Ha ! Ha ! ... In short, I’ve been 
thinking it all out on the way, and have decided that we 


AN AUTUMN AFTERNOON 


i39 

may assemble there next Tuesday night. What do you 
say ?” 

To that neither Jock nor I made objection, and then 
The Schoolmaster turned to me. 

“Do you think your father would undertake to drill the 
men?” he asked. “He is an old soldier.” 

“I am quite sure he would object,” replied I. “He’s not 
in sympathy, you know.” 

The Schoolmaster nodded. “I know,” he said, drawing 
down his brows. “I’m sorry. He would do much better 
than I. But I’ll do the best I can. I had some practice, 
you know, in the Old Country. I was a sergeant in the 
yeomanry. — Well, I must be going.” 

Red Jock hastened to untie his horse, “Ye’ll be fer askin’ 
the rest, Ah doot,” he said. 

“Not today, Jock,” said The Schoolmaster. “I’ve a sort 
of feeling about the Day of Rest. — But tomorrow.” 

Jock nodded with satisfaction. 

“Ah’m no what ye may dub releegious,” he said, “but 
Ah’ve a sort o’ suspeecion aboot the Sabbath. Weel, ye 
may depend on’s, sir. An’ Ah’ll be luikin’ tae see ye sune, 
sir, tae tell me aboot ma bit job. Amang us a.’ we’ll doon 
the autocracy (he called it “ottocrassy”) yet, Ah doot.” 

“That we will, Jock,” laughed The Schoolmaster, and, 
touching his hat with his whip, he rode away. 

“A fine mon that!” exclaimed Jock, looking after him 
admiringly. “Ay the manners o’ a gentleman, and yet wi’ 
a hert that feels fer thae bodies wha hae na a manner at 
a’. Did ye see the touch o’ the hat, Alan? — juist as if we 
wis fine buddies ! An’ him juist cornin’ frae hobnobbin’ 
wi’ the fine fowk i’ the toon ! — Weel he’ll no lose onything 
by’t, an’ Ah doot if it comes tae him leadin’ up a company 
o’ men they’ll gang aifter him gin he chooses tae tak’ 
them tae the middle o’ Lake Ontairio. . . . Noo, Alan, 
come awa’ ben the hoose an’ we’ll hae a bite o’ supper.” 

So we walked in slowly from the road and I sat on 
the doorstep of the little room behind the shop and watched 
him while he fried bacon and eggs in royal quantity, and 


i 4 o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

produced jam from the cupboard, and bread which he cut 
into chunks big enough for Finn McCook 

“Ah cudna’ expec’ Eleezabeth tae fit in tae sic a rough 
bit hoose as this,” he said. “She’s aye a dainty bit. But 
mayhap when the demonstration’s by things’ll be mair fit 
i’ the wilderness.” — “Ah’m no meanin’ that wad mak’ a deef- 
erence wi’ Eleezabeth,” he added, “but Ah’ve a feelin’ that a 
mon shouldna’ expect a wumman tae step intil ower much to 
bear. — Ah’m no sae sure, ye understand that she’ll hae me at 
ony rate, but aye Ah keep mysel’ up wi’ thinkin’ that mayhap, 
when the greetin’s bj fer him that gaed awa’, an’ when the 
bairnies is growed an’ feenished wi’ the schule an’ got 
places maybe, an’ when, maybe, there’s mair siller an’ a 
better hoose than this bit shanty, I’ll speak wi’ her again, 
an’ aiblins she’ll be no sae fain tae turn awa’. It’s a fule 
dream, Alan, Ah doot. But it keeps me ay forgin’ a bit 
o’ soul’s glowin’ as weel’s the bit horse shoes an’ pleugh- 
points an’ wagon tires.” 

When Jock had ended I went to him and held out my 
hand. He caught it in his big brawny one, and we looked 
into each other’s eyes. 


CHAPTER XIV 


A DISS APPEARANCE 

I T is no vr four weeks since I last wrote in my journal, 
and I do not know why I do so now save that I am 
sick at heart and, perchance, seek to find some respite in 
doing the thing that I have done before. And yet I fear 
that the impulse is such as makes us sometimes press on 
a part that pains even though the pain be worse therefor. 

At my last writing I spoke of not finding Barry at the 
tavern that Sunday afternoon. — So long ago, it seems! 
Can it be possible that it was only four weeks ago this 
day? 

She has not been seen since, nor has anyone heard of 
her. 

When she did not come back that night Nick Deveril 
thought nothing of it, holding that she might have stayed 
with some of the neighbors, although that is something 
that she has never done since coming to these parts. 

When she did not return on Monday nor yet on Mon- 
day night, he reached a point of being somewhat moved 
and sent out an alarm, going over to the Joneses’ himself 
to discuss what might be done. 

Then it was that our settlement arose as one man, as 
it always does when dire trouble falls upon one of us. 

Straightway Dick Jones set off on a gallop one way, and 
Mistress Jones another, riding as fast as he, for there is 
no better horsewoman in this country. From farm to 
farm the word was called out, and Tom Thomson and I 
joined in the work of calling it, Tom mounted on his 
fleet-footed Jess, while I put Billy to his speed. But so 
far did my anxiety run ahead of my poor beast that it 

»4i 


142 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

seemed to me that he was going at snail’s pace, and I fear 
I put the spurs to him cruelly. 

'‘Barry Deveril has disappeared!” was the burden of 
our cry. “Go to the tavern!” 

And straightway in the harvest fields men threw down 
their sickles and made away as fast as they could, while 
the women stood at the doors anxious and distraught. 

There was no need to ask what was to be done, for this 
thing had happened once before in our neighborhood — 
though ’twas a little child then that was not to be found, — ■ 
and happens in every settlement, sooner or later, in this 
bush country. And always countenances are grave and 
hearts are sore, for there are many dangers abroad in the 
wilds, — of morass and cliff, of wild animals, and of being 
lost and starved to the death in the trackless forest. 

At the tavern, before ten of the clock, every man in thd 
settlement had arrived, even to the Doctor and the lads 
from the Village and beyond, and were standing, a silent 
group, with the leadership falling naturally to The School- 
master. 

As in a dream I saw it, scarcely conscious of what was 
being done, and wondering why the minutes were so long 
before we could be off. 

Then I felt a touch upon the shoulder and knew that 
Red Jock was close by me. And a moment later Jimmy 
Scott was half whispering to me to be hopeful for the 
Lord would be good to me because of what I had done for 
Hannah. 

Their nearness seemed to give me strength — it is when 
in trouble that a man knows his friends — and presently I 
was able to collect myself and knew that The Schoolmaster 
was marshaling the men into little companies, to spread out 
and pace the forest, the most difficult parts, because of 
rock and boggy swamp, being given to the stronger and 
younger of us,— Big Bill, and Ned Burns, Dick Jones, 
Jimmy Scott and Hank and me, with the lads from the 
Village. 

And so we set out on our terrible journey, going forth 


A DISAPPEARANCE 


i43 

in long lines, with a few yards from man to man; and 
the signal of finding her — scarce yet can I write the 
words — was to be a loud halloo, passed on and on to the 
outermost. 

So we passed all that day, going out every way, looking 
and looking behind the trees and logs and bushes, and 
straining our ears for a halloo. The next day we went 
over the ground, and again the next, going even farther by 
forest .and field ; and then the search narrowed down to 
the few horsemen among us who rode furiously to the 
villages, enquiring in them, and of those whom we met on 
the highway. 

At nights only did we return, hoping for word, and the 
agony of my heart bade fair to mount to madness in my 
brain and might have had it not been for a word of hope 
that came to me. 

On my return after one of the days — which one I do 
not know, for I lost all track of time — someone told me 
that Old Meg had been looking for me, and wished to 
speak with me immediately. 

With a bounding of hope within me — how we snatch 
at straws, we poor mortals! — I hurried to her cabin, and 
she took me past her looms to the little back room where 
she lives. 

Strangely enough, I can remember the conversation, 
though all that went before is lost in a nightmare confused 
of words and grave, bronzed faces and hurrying forms in 
homespun. 

Placing a candle on the table, she sat down near it, and 
motioned me to sit down also, and at the first glance at 
her face I was conscious of two impressions: that there 
was no hopelessness in her countenance, and — oddly enough 
at that moment — that she must have been a fine looking 
woman in her day. 

“Well, what do you think about it all, Alan? Eh?” she 
asked, looking at me. Then, before I could answer, “Listen 
to me, lad. — You think, or have thought, Barry may be 
dead. — I do not.” 


144 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

And I went to her and snatched her hands in mine. 
“Then tell me where she is, for Heaven’s sake!” I said. 
“If you know where she is, tell me!” 

But she pushed me gently away. 

“Sit down,” she said, “and hear me. I do not know, 
Alan; I only surmise. Answer me and help me to know 
that I surmise correctly. — Now,” leaning towards me, and 
speaking very slowly, “answer me this : Do you think Barry 
had any reason for staying longer with Nick Deveril?” 

“Why — no,” I stammered, “except that one expects a 
daughter to stay with her father.” 

She laughed a little. 

“Does Barry seem to you, then,” she asked, “a daughter 
of Nick Deveril?” 

To that I could make emphatic rejoinder. “No. — She 
is surely not spirit of his spirit, though she may be blood 
of his blood.” 

She nodded. “Aye. — Often enough children a^re not 
children, truly, of their parents. In that you speak well, 
Alan. Sometimes there are swans where there should be 
ducklings, and ducklings where there should be swans. It’s 
something I’ve never been able to fathom, though I think 
for the most part heredity proves true. Usually ducks 
bring forth ducklings and swans swans. — But, Alan, what 
if I tell you that Barry was not the daughter of Nick 
Deveril ?” 

I started, but held my head the higher. 

“That makes no difference to me,” I said. 

Again she laughed. 

“Come, come, don’t be short,” she said. ‘Honi soit qui 
mal y pense .’ — What do you say if I tell you that she was 
not the daughter of Mistress Deveril either?” 

And with that I was truly surprised. 

“No?” I said. “But why are you playing with me like 
this? — What I want to loiow is — if Barry — where she 
is ” 

“And I must tell you that I do not know,” Meg re- 
sponded. “Have patience, will you? — Now, answer me: 


A DISAPPEARANCE 145 

If Barry is nothing — never was anything — to the Deverils, 
save a child left with money ta pay for her keep, do you 
think she would now have any reason for staying with 
Nick Deveril?” 

Then the light burst upon me, and I wondered that it 
had not come sooner. 

“No ” I began. 

— “Especially since the woman from Buffalo is proving 
so capable,” went on Meg, smiling. 

“You think, then,” I asked, “that Barry has just — left 
home ?” 

“Just that,” she replied, nodding. 

I sprang up. “But where would she go?” I said pas- 
sionately, yet with hope all singing in my breast. “Why 
did she leave her clothes? — Why ” 

But Meg interrupted again. 

“ — Her clothes. — Everything,” she added quietly — 
“everything but the little embroidered moccasin and the 
silhouette picture of a white man ” 

And then I sat down again, speech paralyzed, but brain 
alive with a hundred wild conjectures. 

Meg was going on, still in the same low, even tones. 

“Perhaps you may not know,” she was saying, “that I 
was the only person here of whom Mistress Deveril made 
— neither friend nor confidante, but something of the kind. 
Remember, she told me little — but reading between I knew 
that she was a woman of some — perhaps you would call 
it ‘family’ — and a woman with a story. Usually, Alan, 
where there’s a woman with a story there’s the memory of 
a tragedy.” 

Here Meg stopped and stared at the floor, — so long that 
I wondered if she would never begin again. And yet I 
did not like to break in upon her reverie. At last, with 
a gesture as though to brush back her dark wavy hair from 
her forehead, she resumed, taking up her speech where 
she had broken it off: 

“ — A tragedy, Alan, and most times of the heart. Be- 
lieve me when I tell you that Mistress Deveril did not 


1 46 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

marry Nick Deveril from choice, but to run away from 
something. What that was I don’t know. But she 
couldn’t run away from herself. She wasn’t very happy, 
poor body. . . . Well, as I was about to say, one day she 
told me that Barry was a strangeling, and that someone 
had left money to pay for the care of her. Further than 
that she said nothing — reticence had become a habit with 
her, I think, — but that is enough to explain Barry’s disap- 
pearance, now that she is no longer needed at the tavern.” 

“But did Barry know?'’ I asked. 

Again Meg gave her quick nod of affirmation. 

“I asked Nick Deveril straight, last night,” she said, “if 
Barry knew, and he said he had told her, a few days be- 
fore. I suspect he was out of temper and hurled it at 
her, poor child. He’s stupid enough, in some ways, barring 
his passion for money, but he’s a temper of his own, too, 
that flares out if anyone crosses him. And I don’t think 
he ever liked Barry. He knew she was too good for that 
house.” 

All this I heard, but my mind was in a maze, my thoughts 
hurrying round and round, without ever seeming to get 
anywhere. 

“But why,” I said, “did she go away without speaking 
a word of it to any of us? Surely that wasn’t necessary.” 

To that Meg could give no satisfaction. “That I can’t 
tell you,” she said. “Probably Barry had her own rea- 
sons.” 

— “And without her clothes,” I persisted, “except those 
she was wearing?” 

To that a little frown of perplexity came on Meg’s coun- 
tenance. “That’s the only puzzle,” she said. “I confess 
that does puzzle me — and worry me a little too. It may 
be that — that an accident has happened. Yet — yes, Alan — 
I feel it, that Barry is alive and well somewhere, knowing 
perfectly just why she did as she has done. I don’t think 
it ever occurred to her that the people here would be so 
troubled. She was almost too modest, was Barry.” 

Again we sat in silence, conjectures crowding upon me — 


A DISAPPEARANCE 


147 

and wondering3. Had Barry run away from me? Where 
had she gone? Would she write to one of us, presently? — 
All this broken upon by the horrible fear that after all 
Meg might be mistaken. . . . And then, in the very midst 
of my agony, so strange is the human mind, I marveled 
at the bearing of this woman who talked with me, and at 
the manner of her speech. 

That night I went home, pondering much the things that 
I had heard, and imagining one course and another that 
Barry might have taken, and into every device entered, per- 
sistently, sometimes extraneously, a vision of the little 
porcupine-quilled moccasin. I would be picturing Barry, 
perhaps in some town or city, making her own fight for 
the sort of life which she had said she sometimes longed 
for — a life of high civilization — and I would be seeing her 
in a gown of flowered silk tripping through glittering halls, 
when suddenly the picture would be blotted out and there 
would be nothing but the little slipper of buckskin with its 
wildwoods embroidery. — And perhaps it was this per- 
sistency that led me to think of the Indians. 

Thenceforth for days and days I rode here and there to 
all the camps of which I could hear, but of Barry I could 
gather not a word, nor of Wabadick, except that he and 
his squaw and papooses had left for the Northern lakes 
“many moons back.” 

From these long rides I would return home, keen with 
the hope that our missing one might have returned, only 
to have my heart thrown down again to its despair, which 
it would have been wholly had it not been for the com- 
forting of my mother and the clinging to Old Meg’s theory, 
which I would not utterly give up. 

Through all the days my father wrestled alone with 
the harvest, and there was still much of it to be saved. 
Coming home one evening my sorrow lifted enough to let 
me think of him, for the temperature had lowered suddenly 
and there was promise of wet days that would destroy or 
injure the out-lying crops. My heart burned with grati- 
tude to him that he had never once asked me to stay, and 


148 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

I was sorry for him, for the loss of a goodly part of the 
harvest is, in this hard new country, no small matter. But 
when I came within sight of the little farm I saw, in the 
fields, a sight that brought a lump to my throat, but a 
kindly grateful lump. Not a stalk was left standing; there 
were new stacks by the little barn, all covered and ready 
for the threshing; while from the fields two or three loaded 
wagons were being driven slowly in, men following, with 
forks on their shoulders. 

“Bless them! ,, I exclaimed to myself. “Heaven bless 
them !” 

They were all there — our nearest neighbors — Jimmy, and 
Big Bill, and Dick Jones and the rest, — with Hank and 
The Schoolmaster and Ned Burns from the Corners; and 
The Schoolmaster was shirtsleeved like the others and was 
walking in beside Big Bill. 

— So great and warm is the heart of this wilderness! 

The drilling has begun, they tell me, behind The Block, 
at Jimmy Scott’s, the men slipping to it by the road, and 
by devious paths through the thick growth of The Block,— 
most of all, perhaps, by the little trail through the forest 
which Jimmy has made to the mill, and along which, often, 
he carries his bag of grain on his back. Great secrecy 
is maintained, in all these doings, but as yet I have not 
been a part of them. 


CHAPTER XV 


PREPARATIONS 

I CANNOT rest. Even yet at every opportunity I must be 
ranging the forests seeking for some clue of Barry, 
some little ribbon or shred of her dress that might indi- 
cate whither she has gone. * Nor, between such times, can 
I settle to work on the farm, for even while my hands 
move it is with little spirit or intelligence, since always and 
always my mind, myself, is roving afar on its fruitless 
quest. 

Last Thursday, keeping to the highways, I rode farther 
than usual, asking many people by the way if they had 
seen or heard aught of our girl. Some of them had seen 
the inquiry about her that has been placed in the papers, 
but further than that knew nothing; so that now, it seems, 
if we can find no information from the Indians, who read 
no papers but carry their news by word of mouth, we can 
hope no further. 

It was far past midnight when I returned to our settle- 
ment, and as I came opposite Red Jock’s blacksmith shop 
I was surprised to see the door open and Jock himself 
standing in the doorway, hugely outlined against the dull* 
glow of red light within. 

“Hallo, there!” he called, and I drew rein and swerved 
my horse in. 

“Whaur hae ye been this time o’ nicht?” he said, coming 
close to me. “Ay searchin’ an’ searching Ah doot, puir 
laddie! Come awa’ ben an’ Ah’ll fin’ ye a bit o’ scone 
an’ a wee drappie tae wash it doon. Ye’ll be sair needin’ 
it, Ah doot.” 

And when I declined he insisted. He had something to 
show me, he said. 


149 


150 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

So I threw myself off and proceeded to tie Billy to the 
hitching-post, while Jock patted him on the flanks with his 
great broad hand. “Ah kent weel ’twas Billy” he said, 
“whan Ah heard him cornin’. There’s a click tae’s canter 
that Ah cudna’ miss amang a score o’ the beasties. Gin it 
hadna’ been fer that Ah doot ye’d ha’ seen nae glint o’ the 
fire thro’ the mirk this nicht, — naught but the bit shop as 
silent an’ glowerin’ ’s the tomb.” 

“That’s what I’m wondering about,” I said. “You’re not 
often up as late as this, Jock.” 

“Ah cudna’ sleep,” he said, “sae Ah juist oot o’ bed an’ 
set tae a bit o’ wark that’s waitin’. The deil o’t wis that 
wi’ the door an window baith tight as drums, the place sune 
het up like the infernal regions,” rolling the words out, — 
“an’ I swat till I wis fair reekin’ ” — Jock dearly loves to 
add to his vocabulary, especially words long and resound- 
ing, and odd enough the effect often is when they inter- 
mingle with his “braid Scots.” 

“But why did you let it get hot as the infernal regions ?” 
I asked. “Why did you have the door and windows 
closed ?” 

“Juist tae haud the glimmer frae shinin’ oot,” he said. 
“Come intae the smiddy an’ see the why o’t.” 

I followed him, and as soon as we had passed through 
the doorway he drew the door to and shot the bolt. “Gin 
a wanderin’ buddy strays alang,” he explained, “it’ll gie’s 
a jiffy tae clean up a bit afore lattin’ him keek in.” 

And then, by the side of the glowing forge I saw a pile 
of metal things that were new to me. 

I picked one of them up and turned it over and over 
without finding enlightenment, while Jock watched me 
amusedly. 

“Weel, what d’ye mak’ o’t?” he asked. 

“It beats me,” I replied. “Is it — is it a new-fangled tip 
for a plow-point?” 

At that he laughed gleefully, bringing the flat of his 
hand down on his “breeks” with a thwack. 

“It’s no that,” he said. 


PREPARATIONS 


151 

“Maybe it’s teeth for a drag,” was my next venture. 

Again he laughed. “Ye’re cornin’ fine I Sune ye’ll be 
roun’ a’ the agricultooral eempliments.” 

“Is it— is it — oh, give it up, Jock. Tell me.” 

And then at once he became very serious and came a 
little closer to me, lowering his voice when next he spoke. 

“Can ye no imagine what use ye cud gar o’t were’t at 
the end o’ a cudgel?” he suggested. 

“Why — it might do for a crow-bar,” I conjectured, “if 
the stick were tough enough, — elm, maybe, or hickory.” 

He nodded quickly, watching me as I still turned the 
article over, examining it more closely. 

“Noo ye’ve said it,” he assented, “elm or hickory maybe, 
— but it’s no fer a crow-bar.” 

“Then what in the name of all curiosity is it?” I said. 
“What in thunder are you doing here in the dead of night 
making trinkets like this?” 

“Trinkets?” he repeated, smiling. “Aye, it’s no sae for- 
midable on the surface o’t as a pleugh-point, is’t ?” 

Then he glanced towards the window over which his coat 
had been hung, as I now saw, in apparent carelessness, 
and lowering his voice, said, 

— “No sae formidable on the first glance o’t as a pleugh- 
point, but, Alan, what d’ye say gin Ah tell ye ifs a head 
fer a pike, laddie?” 

“For a— pike?” 

“Aye — fer a pike. Laddie, they’re bein’ wrought by 
the score an’ the hunnerd i’ the smiddies ower a’ the 
kintra, — awa’ North at the Landin’, an’ South ayont the 
Forks, an’ awa’ tae the West. Noo, hae ye no idea o’t, 
laddie?” 

And then the light broke upon me. 

“They’re not for weapons, Jock!” I exclaimed. 

“Fer juist that,” he replied. “There’ll no be rifles an’ 
muskets tae gang roun’, an’ sae thae pikes is i’ the makin’. 
Laddie, wi’ yer grievin’ ye’ve tint yer grip on the times, 
an’ that’s wi’ nature surely. But, laddie, sinsyne the — 
the mishanter — cam’ tae’s a’ the sad day a month or mair 


152 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

syne, there’s been uncos gae’n on a’ ower the kintra. The 
hale kintra’s juist seethin’, Alan, an’ some day there’ll 
come the spate. Ah doot, laddie, cud ye hae lookit doon 
frae aboon, this nicht, instead o’ skeplin’ alang ower the 
highways, ye’d ha’ seen the forges glowin’ i’ mony o’ the 
wee smiddies, an’ the chiels gangin’ thro’ their paces i’ the 
glens o’ the forest, an’ the fields behint the hills, an’ far 
back frae the paths an’ roadways.” 

“I have heard about the drillings,” I said, “but I did 
not know about the pikes. — They don’t look very danger- 
ous,” I added, dropping the one I held in my hand on the 
pile. 

“Ye’d tell a deeferent tale gin ye got a crunt wi’ ane o’ 
them,” he bristled. “But there’s bullets, too, i’ the makin’. 
Aiblins cud ye keek intil the mill at this vera meenute ye’d 
see Hank, an’ Ned Burns, an’ Dick Jones, an’ mair o’ 
them, bizzy’s bees i’ the claver. They’re warkin’ hard o' 
nichts noo.” 

“They are !” I exclaimed. 

“Aye. An’ e’en i’ the hooses the guidwives an’ kimmers 
is helpin’ wi’ them. But it’s men, no wolves, they’re garin’ 
them for this time.” 

All this almost took my breath away, for I had not 
known that affairs were progressing so. 

“Have they, then, decided to fight?” I asked. — “It 
wouldn’t need many bullets for a ‘demonstration.’ ” 

“Hoots, mon ! Ye wadna’ hae them gang up wi’ dummy 
rifles like a lot o’ weans on the Queen’s birthday,” he said. 
“There’ll maybe no be fechtin’ — yet maybe there wull. 
There’s nae tellin’.” 

And then, finding me interested, he continued: “The 
lads’ll be tae Jimmy Scott’s again the morrow evenin’, an’ 
’ll be unco’ fain tae see ye gin ye tak’ a notion tae gang.” 

“Perhaps I’ll go, Jock,” I said. — “I think I’ve looked 
everywhere.” 

He put his big hand on my shoulder. 

“Ye’ve done that, Alan lad,” he said. “Aiblins the 
lass’ll come back ae day frae somewheres ye’ve no thocht 


PREPARATIONS 


i53 

of at a’, nor wadna’, nor ony of us. An’ ye’re wearin’ yer- 
sel’ oot, laddie. Ye’d better juist be content tae bide a wee, 
noo, an’ see what’ll come o’t.” 

And then I looked away from him and down at the 
little pile of iron pikes, and it seemed to me that all the 
world was full of pikes, and that Fate itself was forging 
pikes to enter my soul. For no longer were there the 
old happy care-free days. Would they never come again? 
Without Barry, for me I knew that they would never 
come. 

So wrapped was I in the sad reverie into which I had 
fallen that for the moment my ears were deaf, and then I 
realized that Jock was saying: 

“But ye’re fair forfairn, laddie, an’ I’ve been haudin’ ye 
frae yer bed tae hearken tae ma clack. Noo juist sit ye 
still an’ Ah’ll get ye a bite an’ sup.” 

He went “ben” and in a moment came back with a ban- 
nock and a cupful of good ale, which I drank gladly 
enough, for indeed I was “fair forfoughten.” 

On the next evening I mentioned to my father the ad- 
visability of my joining the boys at Jimmy’s, and to my 
surprise he did not object. Perhaps he thought the diver- 
sion of the drilling might take me somewhat from the 
melancholy which has taken possession of me and place 
me again on my feet among men. 

So it was that, with little enough interest, I must con- 
fess, I made my way through The Block, pondering as I 
went on how strange are these affections of ours, which, 
for the sake of one beloved, can blot out so large a part 
of the horizon of the world. He must be a great man, I 
thought, who for the welfare of the great whole can turn 
aside from a beloved one; and yet this is what men have 
been called upon many a time to do. 

Near the clearing I fell in with some of the boys con- 
verging towards the little spot which has assumed such 
unwonted significance, and soon our little body was afield, 
“going through our paces” under The Schoolmaster’s in- 


154 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

struction, while Hannah sat on the doorstep knitting. In- 
side, someone said, Mistress Jones and one or two more 
of the women were molding bullets, which may have been 
so, since we did not see a sign of them all evening save, 
now and then, through the doorway, the flit of a skirt. 

Already, I found, the boys were marvelously facile in 
forming fours and standing at attention, and wheeling right 
and left, and all the rest of it; and before it got too dark 
there was some banging with rifles at a target. In this 
some of our lads have long been very proficient, for food- 
getting in the woods demands great quickness of sight and 
motion, so that it is considered no feat at all to notch a 
bull’s-eye in a stationary target. 

This evening Hank’s father dropped in for a while, and 
he and my father talked long about these things, sitting on 
the bench by the door, while my mother, in her Sunday 
gown, sat near them, and I, too, on the doorstep. 

My father thinks the whole affair looks uglier than ever. 
When men begin to shake their fists, he says, it’s a short 
way to using them, the same being true of mobs and na- 
tions; and he always ends by observing that actual rebel- 
lion in this Province, at this time, could result only in dis- 
aster, since a few bush-men, poorly trained at best, and 
worse armed, could have no chance whatever against 
trained militia and perhaps canister. Moreover, failure, 
he holds, would be but the preface to conditions much 
worse than before, since the Government, by way of pun- 
ishment and example, would consider itself justified in 
resorting to, extreme measures. With his experience of 
real war, it seems to me, this opinion might be worth listen- 
ing to, but when I observed that to The Schoolmaster one 
day, he said: “What if the immediate attempt does meet 
wilth disaster? What can it matter if conditions are worse 
than before? In the end the things for which the attempt 
is made must be granted. That has nearly always been 
the way with forward movements. First there must be 
sacrifice. We want things done in a day, or a month, or a 


PREPARATIONS 


I5S 

year. But the Universe moves slowly, so far as man is 
concerned. We cannot hurry it, and yet if we do not 
move at all neither will it move, and all posterity must 
suffer.” 

This, I think, reveals a far vision, which sometimes I 
catch sight of, and yet I cannot but feel, as my father 
does, for the women and children who are here with us 
now, — aye and for the men and lads too, for it is a sore 
thing to fail, when one has thought one has done right, 
and even be compelled to suffer for it. 

Hank’s father is still inclined to pooh-pooh the whole 
matter. The plan will scarcely come to a head, he thinks, 
and he passes over Hank’s enthusiasms by laughing at them, 
as he has always done. “Hank was always an excitable 
youngster,” he says. “He’d run a mile any time to be in 
at a dog-fight.” 

While he talked thus my mother’s face brightened, and 
she brought out a letter from my Uncle Joe, which arrived 
this week -from Toronto, and which seems to corroborate 
his opinion in regard to the unlikelihood of an outbreak, 
stating that the Government is well aware of the on-goings, 
and that prominent Tories at the Capital merely laugh at 
them, thinking very little of would-be soldiers who would 
come up with pikes. — “There aren’t any little Davids now- 
adays,” writes my uncle, to which my father rather dryly 
observes, “But there are plenty of Goliaths.” 

My mother is anxious and nervous about what may come. 
I have observed, however, that women have a tendency 
to try to cross their bridges before they come to them. 

— And now I must to bed, for I am very tired. This 
month of worry seems to have filched my strength as well 
as my spirits. 


CHAPTER XVI 


THE PATERAN! 

(Note: — The pages upon which the narrative was writ- 
ten, for the greater part of this chapter, differ from the 
others in size and quality and are ragged along one edge, 
for the reason that will appear in the reading.) 

I AM writing this in a strange place — namely, in the 
little cave which I have aforetimes visited, some ten 
miles down the river, by the side of the great boulder 
which Hank and I have known as “The Big Beaver.” 

The reason for my being here, however, is very simple. 
I have been caught in the rain and have sought shelter 
both for myself and for Billy, who is standing outside very 
contentedly in the lee of an overhanging ledge of the rock, 
munching his oats and pausing occasionally to give me 
a friendly whinny. 

It is not at all cold, but the rain is falling in a steady 
pour, and as I look out I can see it dripping from the now 
rapidly thinning leaves and running down the tree-trunks 
in little rivulets. Nor does it show the slightest intention 
of letting up, for the sky, wherever a patch of it can be 
seen, is a dull and uniform gray. Nevertheless, still and 
wet as the outlook is, it is not altogether cheerless, since 
the most of the trees in this spot are beech and soft maple, 
and the yellow of their autumn coloring forms a sunshine 
of its own both in the trees themselves and on the floor of 
the forest, which is now covered with a thick carpet of 
gold. Farther away, by the river edge, there are cedars, 
and at one point they part, so that I can get a view of 
the river itself, all punctured and beaten up by the rain. 
Nearer there are some clumps of green fern and some 

156 


THE PATERAN! 157 

stalks of the pretty plant that we call “burning-bush,” 
whose fruit is now ripe and somewhat resembles a split 
beech-nut bur with tiny red berries depending from its 
center. 

Since it is not cold I am quite comfortable, but am very 
thankful, nevertheless, that I brought with me my note- 
book and quills and the cake of solid ink, without which I 
seldom go abroad; and which will help me to pass the time 
until Billy and I can venture abroad again. 

Three days ago I rode down to my father’s sister’s on 
a matter of family business that is not interesting enough 
here to record. Found them all well, and pleased indeed 
to see me and to hear news of our household. 

But it was an incident on the way thither that most en- 
grossed me. 

On the way down I followed, as usual, the highways, 
making use of certain by-paths that I know and prepared 
to sleep overnight somewhere in the forest, which I prefer 
to staying at a tavern provided the weather be dry. There 
is a spring, clear and bubbling, upon one of the by-paths — 
a bush road, or trail, rather, which is seldom traveled — 
and this spot I determined to reach, if possible, so that I 
could make it my camping-place for the night. 

In this I was successful. At about six of the evening 
I found the spring, so lost no time in tethering Billy and 
giving him a drink and feed; then I made my own fire, 
which was easily enough done in this spot because of the 
paper-birch trees. ... It is sometimes very amusing to 
see the efforts of a greenhorn in the bush to make a fire. 
Usually he piles a heap of stuff and proceeds to light it as 
one might kindle the fire in a fireplace, the result being 
that sometimes the blaze goes out and sometimes becomes 
rather ungovernable, which is a matter of some anxiety 
always, and especially during the drier months. The sea- 
soned bushman, on the contrary, first selects his site with 
care, choosing, if possible, a gravelly spot or a flat rock 
where there will be little trouble in quenching the coals 
afterwards. Next he collects his little bundle of birch 


158 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

bark and lays a few dry sticks across, then sets the fire 
going from his steel and flint, adding to it, little by little, 
until the blaze is as lusty as needed. 

Mine I built on a gravelly place from which the water 
below the spring, in April freshets, has washed the soil 
away, and soon I had my bit of bacon frizzling and sending 
forth tempting odors. With some bread and a draught 
of water from the spring it made a good enough meal for 
a hungry man. 

The next step was to make my bed, no difficult matter 
for one who has experience, using balsam boughs and plac- 
ing them in over-lapping rows, layer upon layer, until a 
deep, springy resting-place had been improvised, more 
fragrant, I wager, than the couch of any monarch, for 
surely in all the world there is no perfume more refreshing 
that that of the freshly severed boughs, and no air more 
pure and sweet than that of the primeval forest. 

Shortly after dark I lay down, fully clad, as one must 
be when sleeping in the open woods, trusting to my bit of 
tarpaulin for protection against probable dews, and my 
rifle by my side as a guard against possible intruders. 

Not a sound was to be heard save Billy’s crunching at 
some woods grass that I had cut for him, and the soft 
murmuring in the tops of the trees, broken, occasionally, 
by the sharp click of a leaf, as it loosened from its anchor- 
age and came floating down to join its kin on the ground; 
and I was rather glad that it was autumn since I could 
look up and see, through the network of branches, the 
silent stars. When last I slept in this spot the year was 
knee-deep in June, and the leafage so dense that it made 
a thick roof overhead that enshrouded everything beneath 
in a thick and impenetrable gloom. 

So I lay there, wondering about Barry, and whether the 
boys were all busy at Jimmy’s this soft star-lit night, until 
the forest and the night began to drift away and presently 
I fell into a heavy sleep. 

I must have been startled before realizing it, for suddenly 
I found myself sitting up, with my eyes wide open. 


THE PATERAN! 


i59 

At first I thought I must have heard a great owl with its 
To-whoo, to-whoo. Then in a trice, at a very short dis- 
tance,, someone called “Halloo ! Halloo !” 

There was no answer, but in a moment the sound of light, 
fleet footsteps bounding through the forest. 

“Where is that confounded spring?” said a voice, ap- 
parently of the hallooer. “I thought I knew.” 

To this there was a low rejoinder, the approaching one 
evidently having arrived, and then a short colloquy in sub- 
dued tones which did not reach me. 

“Howard Selwyn, if I’m not mistaken !” I exclaimed 
to myself, but still sat motionless, while the footsteps ap- 
proached, rustling through the fallen leaves. 

In a moment the two figures emerged, and I could see 
the faint outlines of them as they went down to the spring, 
the tall form of the first speaker, and a much shorter and 
slighter one, evidently that of a mere lad. 

“I haven’t been so thirsty in a six weeks,” went on the 

first voice. “I suppose it was that smoked fish you in- 

flicted upon us tonight. I swear I’m fast developing an 
Indian palate like yours, my boy. I can go muskrat, 
beaver, bear, groundhog and hedgehog — porcupines is it, 
you call them ? — but I draw the line at fish smoked until it’s 
black all through.” 

“Selwyn, sure as I’m here !” I said to myself ; and then 
I heard his light laugh at some low words from the boy 
which did not reach me. 

“Oh, anything you like,” he went on, in response. 

The two paused at the edge of the water, and Selwyn 

drank long, while the lad dipped up a bucketful. 

“Adam’s ale,” exclaimed Selwyn, when he had finished 
his draught. “Fit for a king, and the very thing for 
Indian lads and wandering Englishmen. Were I king, my 
boy, I’d knight you for bringing us to this camping place. 
That’s the coldest water I’ve had this summer.” 

With that Billy, tethered near me, moved his feet in 
the leaves and blew the breath through his nostrils audibly 
in the way that horses do — though whether sneeze, or sigh, 


160 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

or imitation of a night-hawk, I have never yet made out. 

The two turned and looked in the direction of the sound, 
and then Selwyn caught sight of my smoldering fire on 
the gravel. “By Jove, there’s a fire, too,” he said. “There’s 
someone about.” 

At once I arose and went down the slope. 

“Just I, sir,” I said. “I’ve made my bed here for the 
night, but shall be off with the daybreak.” 

Selwyn held out his hand instantly. “What ! My young 
hero of the rapids!” he exclaimed. Then, in his bantering 
way, “What means this? ’Twas on the Styx we met the 
last time, and now here we meet again in the midst of these 
Plutonian shades. I swear I’d like to get a good look at 
you in broad daylight. . . . Which way are you traveling?” 

“Southward, sir.” 

“Alas!” he exclaimed in mock tragedy, “And we go 
North! At all events Fate has crossed our paths again. 
What do you make of that?” 

“Is there ” I began, but he halted me. 

“Hold!” he said. “Now I remember me that you are a 
youth of much argument, and I am not in humor for argu- 
ment considering that it’s cool and my nether extremities 
aren’t over-well clad. Fate crosses us again. Granted. 
Now I think it means that you are to sleep in my tent to- 
night instead of out here among the dews and porcupines 
and perhaps worse.” 

“I thank you very much,” I said, “but I’m very com- 
fortable. A bed of boughs isn’t to be despised, with or 
without cover.” 

“That it isn’t,” he replied, “as I know well, for this 
Indian lad of mine is an expert at making them. Here, 
Eyes-of-the-f orest ” 

But the Indian lad had disappeared in the darkness 
among the trees. 

“He’s like the wind,” laughed Selwyn, “now here now 
there, and you never know when he goes nor where he 
sleeps. But he’s always within reach when I call. They’re 
an odd people, these North Americans of yours.” 


THE PATERAN! 161 

“Very odd/’ I said, “with some things to mend and many 
to recommend in them.” 

Selwyn prepared to move on. 

“So you’ll not accept the hospitality of my wigwam?” he 
said. “I think I can promise you an early start and a good 
breakfast. Eyes-of-the-forest — whom Downs calls ‘Peter’ 
and who calls himself ‘Nahneetis’ — will see to the one, and 
Downs to the other. Or perhaps Nahneetis himself will see 
to your breakfast also, in which event you will be well 
looked to. ‘Nahneetis,’ he tells me, means ‘Guardian of 
Health.’ Now what about partridge roasted with hot stones 
in a hole in the earth? How would that suit you? With 
fresh bush bannocks and wild honey ? Or perhaps you’d 
prefer some of Eyes-of-the forest’s smoked fish.” 

To all of which I declined as gracefully as I could. 

“No?” he went on. “I can’t tempt you? Then perhaps 
you will tell me how that little girl at the tavern is, — Barry 
you call her?” 

With that there crushed in upon me the sharp cramping 
upon my heart that always comes when her name is men- 
tioned, but the words leaped from my lips. 

“You have heard nothing of her?” 

He perceived my emotion, and even through the gloom 
I could see his keen look directed upon me. 

“Why, nothing,” he said. “Has anything happened?” 

And then he sat upon a log, and motioned me to sit 
beside him, and I had to tell him the whole story, to which 
he listened with rapt attention, appearing to be truly 
sorry, and promising to keep eyes and ears alert for any 
trace of her while on his wanderings from place to place. 

After that he went to his wigwam, and after a time I 
too went to my bed, and drew the tarpaulin over me, and 
lay there awake for a long time, looking up at the stars 
and thinking about all the events of this year which have 
fallen so strangely upon our uneventful lives. Had it not 
been for the trouble that has come upon me, I could have 
been very happy, with the light breeze just moving over 
my face, and the sweet odors and quiet sounds of the 


1 62 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


forest all about, and Billy for companionship; but I per- 
ceive that our happiness depends almost altogether upon 
the thoughts and affections within, and but a small portion 
upon the things that are without. 

At daybreak I was awake, and soon Billy and I had 
breakfasted and were off. In a few moments, down the 
trail, we passed Selwyn’s little encampment, three small wig- 
wams made of poles, with a bit of tarpaulin about the top, 
and boughs of the balsam below. 

Near by the horses — three of them— were tethered, and 
raised their ears and whinnied at Billy as we passed. 
Otherwise there was no sign of life, not even a curl of 
smoke from the flat rock upon which were the ashes from 
the last night’s burning. 

The rest of my journey was accomplished without inci- 
dent. 

And now here I sit in my cave, half way on the home 
journey. The rain still pours, and from my sheltered spot 
I can see the river still thickly pitted with the drops. Since 
there is nothing better to be done for a while, I think I shall 
lie down and have a sleep. 

Here once more in my little room beneath the rafters, 
and have just taken from the pocket of my best coat the 
bundle of notes which I wrote in the cave, and which I 
had quite forgotten. 

But little wonder, for this time I have a great thing to 
write in my journel. 

Barry lives! 

Yes, she lives — of that I am certain, and, though I should 
never meet her more, my heart throbs with joy at just 
knowing that somewhere she is alive and, perhaps, happy. 

The reason that I know is this: When I awoke from 
my sleep in the cave, the first thing my eyes rested upon, 
when I had recollected where I was, was — a little pater an! 

Yes, a little pateran — Barry’s own little pateran of twigs, 


THE PATERAN! 163 

crossed one over the other and laid from the very floor of 
my cave so that I could not in any wise miss seeing. 

At first I sat up and stared, in a sort of maze, wonder- 
ing whether I were not dreaming. 

Then the great joy came to me, and I touched the little 
twigs with my fingers, and sought indication where they 
should lead me. But at the farther end there was no twig 
“pointing like an index finger” — Barry’s own little sign — 
that might give me its message. Straight towards the river 
the little causeway led, for a rod or so, then ended abruptly. 

To the river’s bank I bounded, but there was no sign 
of any human being. Then I hallooed, again and again. 
No voice answered. And so I returned to the cave to wait, 
and took up some of the little twigs, and pressed them to 
my lips, and placed them in my pocket closest to my heart. 

So night fell, and day came again. 

In the long hours I had time to think it all out, and 
though there was some sadness in the thinking, so greatly 
was the sadness overshadowed by joy, and is still, that it 
mattered scarcely at all. For Barry lives, — nothing can 
change that. Without doubt she passed, by the river, as I 
slept, — but, whether up or down I could not know, for the 
river tells no tale of passing canoes. 

Near me she was, as I slept, yet she did not awaken me, 
nor leave word nor sign other than the little pateran, 
placed there in playfulness ! Yes, she was there, the old 
Barry, — playful, whimsical, elusive, alluring. Coming si- 
lently as the night, she slipped off again as silently. Me, 
she does not want nor need, but I can rest content that no 
mishap has come to her, and live in the hope that some day 
she may come back to me. 

In the meantime I must just wait. The searching is 
ended. 


CHAPTER XVII 


TORONTO 


S I write this, on this fifth day of November, 1837, I 



X*. am not sitting in my little room under the rafters, 
but in another, very daintily furnished, with a window that 
looks out upon the bay, so that continually I have a chang- 
ing picture from it, of gleaming water, now rose-streaked, 
now blue, or green, or silver, or iridescent, according to the 
time of day, if the sun shines, but very steely and sullen 
when the skies are gloomy and the snowflakes begin to fall 
as they do of late. 

The reason of my being here is this — and I think I shall 
write all of the dear scene in detail, for I may confess to 
my journal that sometimes I am more than a little home- 
sick, and very much given to living over the old home 
days. 

Upon the afternoon of which I write we had had a bee 
in the fallow — a very small one — for burning up some logs 
and slash which should have been disposed of long before, 
in August or September, but which my father and I could 
not manage this year to get ready in time. However, a 
short dry spell, with high winds, dried everything out so 
that we thought we might venture, and so invited a few of 
the boys — Dick and Fred Jones, and Hank, and Ned, and 
one or two more, who brought oxen and chains as usual. 

At any other time, after a bee, the evening would have 
ended in a dance, but the boys had doings afoot with The 
Schoolmaster and left immediately after supper, while I 
returned to the fallow for some things I had forgotten and 
that I feared might be in the way of the fire. 

It was quite dark then, and so I sat down for a time to 


164 


TORONTO 


165 

look at the scene, for I think there can be nothing more 
beautiful than a log-burning in a fallow at night. About 
the log-heaps the flames licked and curled, creeping upward 
and upward in long, red tongues, and sending up columns 
of smoke that spread out like reddish misty trees in the 
flickering light. All about, the little knolls and hollows 
seemed to move as the shadows wavered and shifted, like 
a restless sea of black with red-crested waves; while be- 
yond all stood the great silent wall of the forest, grim as 
though in wordless protest against this fiery disposal of its 
children. 

As I sat there enjoying the pleasant warmth, for the 
evening was chill, Blucher lay beside me, head erect, ears 
up, very much interested in such unwonted doings, but 
quite trustful that all must be for the best, and, indeed, 
we must have stayed over long, for presently my father’s 
voice could be heard, at a little distance, hallooing. 

I replied to it and arose, and as we approached each 
other, with the firelight glowing upon us, I could see that 
he held a letter. 

“Is there some news?” I asked. 

“Just a letter from your Uncle Joe,” he replied. “Tom 
Thomson left it in on his way from the Corners. Your 
Uncle wants you to go up to Toronto at once. If you 
decide to do that you can get a chance with Tom in the 
morning. He’s going up on business and can bring Billy 
back.” 

“Whew!” I said. “This is rather short notice, isn’t it?” 

And then we sat down and I read the letter by the fire- 
light. 

Briefly this was its content: The young man in my 
uncle’s apothecary shop had recently left, leaving a place 
there which my uncle would like to have me fill for the 
winter. Since his patients always increased in number in 
the cold weather, and it was absolutely necessary for him 
to make his rounds, there would soon be less time that he 
himself could spend in his dispensary, yet there was much 
there that I could do quite well with such instruction as 


1 66 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


he could give me between times. Besides, he thought I 
should have a taste of city life. 

“You’ve always said,” he wrote, addressing my father, 
“that you wanted your son to be an all-round man. Just 
the way I feel, my dear fellow, about my own family, — al- 
though, by the same token, all my boys are girls! Any- 
how I’ve done my best with them. Nora and Kate can 
ride like dragoons and swim like minnows, and the two 
little ones, Mollie and Dora, are coming on after them. 
Shoot, too ! You ought to see Nora with a rifle ! And now 
she’s for learning with the bow and arrows too. But there's 
the Colleen for you ! She can ride all day and dance all 
night, and then get the breakfast ready for her mother if 
need be, chipper as a wren, before eight o’clock in the 
morning. If I remember your lad, Alan, right, she and 
he will get along like a house afire. I’ll be glad to have 
him here, too, to keep off some of the other young gallants. 
They’re beginning to come around like bees about a hive 
of honey, by Jove! — altogether too thick for my notion. 
. . . Everything considered, you had better send the boy 
along — the sooner the better, for me. Of course my dear 
sister there and you will miss him, but you can live your 
lover-days over again and it won’t be long until spring. 

“Your Affect. Brother-in-law, 
“Joe.” 

Then there followed a very characteristic post-script : 

“P. S. If you don’t let him come I’ll think it’s because 
you’re afraid to trust him with such a dyed-in-the-wool 
Tory as your Affect. Brother-in-law. Of course I’ll argue 
with him. By the powers, that I will! It will afford me 
the greatest pleasure in the world to knock some of those 
damn Reform notions out of his head, if I can. But I don’t 
forget that he’s half Scotch, half Irish — a combination that 
never yet made a mixture easy to handle. So you can 
trust him to hold his own, one way or another, as you 
probably know. He looks like his Irish grandfather, and 
he was the very devil. You’d never know what way he was 
until the last minute and then he’d down with his head 


TORONTO 


167 

and ram through, like a Kerry bull — horns first, tail fly- 
ing, — and it didn’t take the Lord to know where he was 
going then ! But I must stop this. Send the lad along and 
give nine-tenths of my love to Mary Machree. You may 
keep the other tenth for yourself.” 

When I had ended the letter my father was smoking his 
pipe and gazing solemnly at the blazing log-piles. 

“Well, what do you think about it?” he said. 

“What does mother think about it?” I asked. 

He took out his pipe and knocked its contents out on a 
stone, absent-mindedly, for he had just filled it. 

“You know,” he said, “we’ve always said you should 
have a while in the city. We had hoped it would be at 
the Upper Canada College, but the money doesn’t seem 
to have come in enough for that.” 

“It doesn’t matter, father,” I said, for I knew that this 
was a sore subject with him. “I’ve had the books, and you 
and mother have helped me past the schools here. Don’t 
you remember how, when I was only ten years old, you 
put me through the pons asinorumf ” 

He smiled with the remembrance. “It was so little we 
could do,” he said, “but we did our best. And there were 
the books — aye.” 

For a moment I waited. 

“So you think I had better go?” I asked. 

“Your mother and I think you must decide for yourself,” 
he replied. “We think it a good chance, — of course.” 

“Perhaps,” I agreed, but I confess that thoughts of 
leaving Hank, and of the boys drilling, and of the remote 
possibility that Barry might return to the neighborhood, 
were buzzing through my mind so that I could hardly 
form a clear idea at all. 

“After all, it’s well for you to see more than one side of 
life,” said my father. 

“It must be,” I agreed. 

“Your mother says,” he went on, “that if you’re going 
up with Tom in the morning you’d better come in at once 


1 68 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


and see what’s to be taken. I left her washing out your 
shirts.” 

“So it’s all settled,” I said, smiling, and with that we" 
arose and went through the dark fields to the little home. 

“He’s going, Mary,” said my father, as we entered, and, 
indeed, my dear mother already had my best things out, 
and was sorting them ready to put in the traveling bag. 
“You’ll not have to take much,” she said. “You’ll need 
better things there and can buy them in the shops.” 

It wa£ not long after daybreak when I left them. “I’ll 
be home at Christmas if not sooner,” I assured them, and 
my mother smiled and choked back the tears. “Yes, if 
the roads are fit,” she said. And then I rode away, turn- 
ing at last to wave to them as they stood at the gate in 
the gray morning light. 

On the way here Tom and I had a satisfactory though 
uneventful journey, over fairly hard-frozen roads, and, 
arrived at my uncle’s there was another good-bye to say 
to Billy, and big enough was the lump in my throat, I do 
confess, as I saw him go off with Tom, the empty saddle 
on his back. 

But it was necessary to hide such softness, for my uncle 
was there, and my aunt, and all the girls, swarming out of 
the door like so many bees, and all very hearty and glad 
to give me welcome. Right to the sidewalk they came, 
bare-headed, just as they were, and my uncle pounded me 
on the back and aunt and the girls kissed me, nor could we 
go in at all until they had all looked me up and down, and 
asked for the folk at home, and told me how pleased they 
were to have me. 

“Taller than I am, by the powers !” exclaimed my uncle. 
“By Jove, boy, it takes the backwoods to put inches and 
girth on a young fellow!” 

“Still he is like his grandfather,” added my aunt, “only 
taller and broader, of course.” 

“Well, don’t keep him out here in the cold, while you 
admire him,” laughed Kate, and then Nora caught me by 


TORONTO 


169 

the arm and the two little girls insisted on struggling off 
with my traveling bag, and so we went in in hilarious 
procession, everybody talking and laughing at once. 

Uncle Joe’s house, it seems to me, is quite fine, very com- 
modious and comfortable, though built but of wood, painted 
white. There is a portico at the door, and the windows are 
many, and protected by green shutters. Behind there are 
some fine forest trees, which have been left standing, while 
in front there is a garden for flowers enclosed by a picket 
fence, also painted white. 

Inside there are fireplaces with marble mantels in every 
part of the house, and in the long hall that leads from the 
front door a fine broad staircase of polished oak, with carpet 
so soft that never a footfall sounds as one ascends. In all 
the rooms there are such carpets, so that, were it not for 
the merry talk and laughter, the place would be very silent 
indeed. The chairs and sofas, too, are very soft and deep, 
and are so many that, with the marble-topped tables, and 
pictures, and brass sconces and andirons, the whole place 
looks most elegant. 

Upon the first evening, as we sat about the fire in the 
family parlor, I had to tell all about the dear home and the 
manner of living of our people, all of which was especially 
interesting to the girls, who have never visited us. 

Uncle Joe declared that the bush country, with its tree- 
felling, and logging-bees, and strenuous out-of-door life, is 
the very place for the making of men. 

“And of gentlemen, too, dear, “added my Aunt, “when 
there are such mothers as Mary.” 

Which words were very kind of them to say and very 
pleasing to me to hear. 

Kate, who appears something of a patrician in her ideas, 
said she thought it was charming of my mother to stay in 
such savage surroundings; she herself would be frightened 
to death to see Indians walk into the house without knock- 
ing or have to walk at any time through woods where she 
might meet bears or lynxes; but this Nora received with 
a peal of laughter. 


170 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“Now, Kate,” she said, “you know very well you’re not 
one bit more afraid than I am.” Then — turning to me — 
“Kate, you must know, Alan, likes to make being afraid 
an excuse for always having an escort. It’s so much more 
romantic, you know, to have that young ” 

But she could go no further, for Kate’s hand was over 
her mouth, whether in irritation or playfulness I could not 
make out. 

“Anyhow,” Nora declared, freeing herself, “/ think it 
must be lovely where you live, and I’m promising myself 
a holiday there next summer.” 

The girls are all very beautiful, especially Kate, but there 
is a something about Nora that makes her most attractive, 
even more so, I think, than Kate. At first I thought this 
was a certain sprightliness or life, that is lacking in the 
more graceful and haughty elder sister, but later I have 
come to the conclusion that it is Nora’s great naturalness 
and spontaneity that make her chief charm. Very evi- 
dently — although he tries to hide it — she is her father’s 
favorite. 

Since coming here I have been to every part of the 
city, and find it much grown since I was last here, though 
with the houses still much scattered, the better ones being 
surrounded by large parks of trees, with driveways, which 
make them look very imposing, — at least to my backwoods 
eyes. Nearly all of the houses are clap-boarded and, for 
the most part, very neatly painted, although a few are 
strongly built of brick. Uncle Joe’s is on King Street, 
where there are some quite fine places, especially towards 
the West, where the residence of the Lieutenant-Gover- 
nor stands at a short distance from the shore. 

Along some of the streets there are plank sidewalks, 
with here and there a space flagged with stones from the 
bay, and along part of King and Front Streets the busi- 
ness houses are quite closely set, the best buildings being 
about the corners of King and Frederick Streets. But for 
some distance up Yonge Street there are also some busi- 


TORONTO 


171 

ness places, with scattered houses and taverns, and some 
very fine private dwellings even north of Lot Street. 

One of my earliest visits was paid to the Garrison, which 
I had not seen closely before, and where there are low 
forts and a number of cannon on a commanding position at 
the head of the bay, overlooking the wharf at which sup- 
plies for the garrison are landed. The place is not very 
interesting just now, however, because there are very few 
about, the soldiers having been taken away, for the most 
part, some short time ago and sent to Kingston. 

But further detail I will leave to some future time, as 
I am now tired of writing and somewhat sleepy also. I 
wonder if my mother and father are sleeping peacefully 
under the stars, or if my mother is lying awake, as she 
so often does, and thinking of me. 

And I wonder where is Barry this night. I must keep 
watch, for some day she may come to this place, which is 
so much a center for our Upper Province, and I would 
look on her face, but for an instant, to know that she is 
well and happy. 


CHAPTER XVIII 

AT ST. JAMES’ 

W ELL, don’t you want to come and hear the Devil 
preach ?” 

This was the missile that Uncle Joe hurled at me through 
the usual hilarity of the breakfast-table this morning. 

For a moment I stared at him, and then I burst out 
laughing. 

“Oh, is he as bad as that?” I said, while Uncle Joe sat 
looking at me, his eyes twinkling, both elbows on the table, 
his knife in one hand and his fork in the other, so that his 
round bald head and beaming face shone out between them 
like a sunflower through the pickets of a palisade. 

“Joe!” exclaimed my aunt, reproachfully, but smiling at 
thq same time, for Uncle Joe entertains her mightily. 
“What a way to speak of dear Dr. Strachan ! And do take 
your elbows off the table and put down your knife and 
fork!” 

My uncle immediately assumed a decorous position, but 
expostulated : 

“Good Lord, my dear ! Can’t a man do as he likes even 
in his own house, and in his morning jacket? Tear an’ 
ages, it’s time enough to be starched when a fellow gets 
on a board front and evening clothes! Now confess, Oc- 
tavia, I was the pink of perfection at my Lord Chief Jus- 
tice’s dinner party. Wasn’t I, now?” — immediately pro- 
ceeding to rub his bald plate with both hands, and beaming 
upon her through his spectacles. 

“Very much so,” returned my aunt, smiling, as she ar- 
ranged the tea-cups, for she herself always pours the tea, 
and very prettily too. “But, Joe dear, don't rub your head 
in the very middle of breakfast, please! What’s got into 
you this morning?” 


172 


AT ST. JAMES’ 173 

“A surfeit of dignity, my ” he began, upon which the 

girls burst out in a peal of laughter. 

“I mean the result of a surfeit of dignity,” he added, cor- 
recting himself. “A sort of after-the-banquet letting down, 
my dear. Octavia, when a man’s been at high-falutin’ din- 
ners on end for a week, he’s ready to stand on his head let 
alone polish it.” 

“But what an example for the children!” persisted Aunt 
Octavda, glancing proudly at the two little girls, Mollie and 
Dora, with their pink cheeks and curly hair tied up with 
blue ribbons, who were enjoying the fun as much as any- 
one. 

Uncle Joe wagged a finger at them. 

“Now remember, you chickabiddies, when you’re as old 
as your daddy, with your heads like two billiard-balls, you 
must by no means polish ’em at the breakfast table. By 
no means ! When they need polish you must do it in your 
own rooms, my dears ! Do you hear what I say ?” 

Whereupon the two little mischiefs burbled out into 
laughter like bobolinks. 

“Now that that's settled,” remarked Nora, smiling at 
her father, “perhaps Alan will have time to say whether 
he wishes to hear the Devil preach.” 

“Nora!” exclaimed my aunt; but Nora blew a kiss at 
her and turned to me. 

“I shall be delighted to take any risk,” I said, “provided 
I may accompany my fair cousin.” 

She sprang up and made me a low curtsey, drawing out 
her crinolined skirt and dropping on one knee until her 
curls fell all over her face, then resumed her seat. 

“What are you going to do, Kate ?” she asked. 

“Oh,” said Kate, elevating her head very high in mock 
of being offended, and looking down at her plate as she 
daintily cut off a bit of comb honey, “since I’m not in- 
cluded, I’m going to church by myself, and then home to 
dinner with Anne, and then out riding.” 

“Oh, with Pinky, I suppose,” returned Nora. 


i 7 4 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“Yes,” assented Kate, — “But I do wish you wouldn’t 
call him ‘Pinky,’ Nora. It sounds so, so ” 

“So eminently unsuitable to a young officer with a rose- 
bud for a mouth and perfume in his hair,” cut in Uncle 
Joe. Upon which little Mollie burbled out again. “Oh 
daddy, how funny! He must be a moss rose.” 

And then Kate pretended to pout a little, and Aunt Oc- 
tavia found herself called upon to say that Percival was 
a “very nice-mannered young man,” and my uncle to re- 
mark that he was “all right as an ornament.” 

“Kate doesn’t really care about him,” Nora said to me, 
aside, “and Daddy knows it.” 

So the merry talk went on, as it always does in this 
house. 

Very decorous, however, was the family that, arrayed 
in Sunday best, issued from the door a little later and went 
along King Street to the sound of the bell of St. James, 
the little girls ahead, Kate, my aunt and I next, with Uncle 
Joe bringing up the rear with Nora. 

“I like to walk with Nora,” said he. “She never hangs 
on like a morning-glory, but walks along like a grenadier, 
by gad ! — with her head up, and on her own two feet !” 

In perhaps fifteen minutes we had arrived at the church, 
which I had before seen but have not hitherto noted in 
my journal. It is still called “the new church,” although 
erected seven years ago, and is a stone edifice, over one 
hundred feet in outside length, I judge, and perhaps sev- 
enty-five in width, and appears to me very imposing, al- 
though the tower is not yet completed. Inside, too, it 
appears to me quite magnificent, with its great stained win- 
dow, and deep transepts, and high pews, of which a 
special one, marked out by a canopy, is reserved for the 
Lieutenant-Governor and his suite, — this, I remember, be- 
ing the occasion for a criticism from The Schoolmaster once 
when he returned from a visit to the Capital : “A reserved 
seat in the House of God !” he had exclaimed. 

When we reached the church the people were arriving 
in crowds, some in very fine coaches with footmen, drawn 


AT ST. JAMES’ 175 

by the most beautiful horses I have ever seen in harness. 
When I remarked on this splendor, however, Kate pre- 
pared me for still greater by saying “Wait until you see 
the Governor’s and Dr. Strachan’s!” 

It was very diverting to me, too, to look at the garb 
of the people, and it was not difficult to point out the very 
rich, although, it seemed to me, the majority of the women 
were quite fine enough, with their silk gowns and Paisley 
shawls and gay bonnets. The men, for the most part, 
wore long black coats that flapped out loose at the bottom, 
and very high collars with cravats of black or white, the 
whole being completed very well indeed by tall hats of 
silk or castor, which, I notice, give great dignity, even to 
men who might otherwise look quite short and thick. 
When I remarked this to Nora, she said it was “a great 
pity some ever had to take them off,” but laughed so good- 
humoredly that there was no unkindness in the remark, 
as appeared the more evident when she gave her father a 
sly poke saying, “Isn’t that so, Daddy?” Indeed there is 
never a sting to anything that Nora says, although she 
dearly loves to have a joke at the expense of anyone at all, 
including herself. I do not in the least mind making re- 
marks to her that reveal my backwoodsness, or asking her 
advice when I am in doubt as to what I should do or 
wear, for I know her common sense is great enough to let 
her see that ignorance in regard to these things is no real 
ignorance at all, but comes only from lack of opportunity 
for seeing. ... It seems to me that this quality of under- 
standing is a great thing in a woman. 

It was a great comfort to me this morning to feel that, 
because of my new clothes, in regard to which she ad- 
vised me, I felt quite well at ease among these people, and 
I have this afternoon written a letter to my mother de- 
scribing my new outfit as well as I could, even to the color 
of the breeches and the twist of the cravat. Last Sunday 
I would not go to church because they were not then home 
from the tailor’s, and now I am glad I would not, for I 
perceive that when one is dressed as well as his neigh- 


17 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

bors he does not think of himself at all, whereas, if he is 
at all shabby, or so odd as to be noticed, he becomes self- 
conscious and is likely to make mistakes and appear less 
worthy than he is. 

At the door of the church we spent some moments in 
hand-shakings, and I was introduced by my aunt to two 
or three people whose names I did not catch, and by my 
uncle to two or three more whose names he forgot entirely 
to give me, or mine to them, his mode of procedure being 
somewhat on this wise: “How are you Barnabas? — Nice 
day! This is my nephew from down the country. Poor 
frail-looking little rat, isn’t he? . . . Fine day, Jerry! 
How’s the wife? — Better? Oh that’s good, that’s good! 
Keep her in bed a day or so yet. By the way, this young 
buck is my sister’s son. Mary, you know. You remember 
Mary.” All of which did not enlighten me very much as 
to what I should call my new acquaintances, should neces- 
sity arise. 

But at last the hand-shakings were over, and we entered 
the church, I well pleased that it was still early enough 
so that I could look about at the people in the pews and as 
they came in. Some of them I already knew by sight, for 
in a place like this celebrities are soon pointed out; and 
any deficiency in my knowledge in regard to the rest was 
rectified as rapidly as might be by Nora, who kept whisper- 
ing to me behind her prayer-book until set in place by a 
look from her mother. So I soon came to know where 
sat the Baldwins, the Powells, the Jarvises, the Ridouts, 
the Cawthras, the Boultons, and many others, including the 
Chief Justice Robinson, who is one of the handsomest men 
I have ever seen, very “patrician,” as Kate says of him, 
with clear-cut features and a bearing that might well be- 
come a prince of any land. 

Especially was I interested in looking at the face of 
Mister Baldwin of whom I have heard so many good words 
spoken as long as I remember, and I found his expression 
very kindly and benevolent, befitting the good reports of 
him. Of Doctors Rolph and Morrison, and Mister Bidwell 


AT ST. JAMES’ 177 

I saw nothing, and, indeed, have forgotten since to ask 
whether they go to this church, although I intended to do 
so. 

And then I spent a moment or so in looking at the mili- 
tary officers, who sat in a long pew reserved for them on 
the West side of the Governor’s, the corresponding one on 
the East side being reserved for such members of the 
Assembly as choose to use it while the House is in session. 
The military officers present were very well set up men, 
very brilliant and soldier-like in their scarlet uniform, with 
braid and epaulets, but they were comparatively few in 
number because, as I have before remarked, some short 
time ago Sir John Colbome, who is now the military head 
of Canada, had all of the militia removed from here to 
Kingston, for what reason no one knows, although it is said 
by some that he wants to have them more at hand in case 
of an open outbreak in the Lower Province. 

So I sat there, all eyes and ears, and more than once I 
found it hard to realize that I was now actually looking, 
with my own two eyes, upon so many of those men of 
whom I have so long heard — of some good report and of 
others far from good — and all the while I kept my eye 
especially on the Lieutenant-Governor’s pew lest I should 
miss the first sight of him. 

I need not have feared that, however, for at the very 
last minute he came in, with his company, with great air 
and ostentation, so that the whole church must know some 
personage was entering. 

“So that’s His Excellency, Sir Francis Head I” I ex- 
claimed, to myself, and was gratified that he sat in such a 
position that I could observe him closely. 

A rather small and slight man, he proved to be, but 
handsome no doubt most people would call him, although 
it seemed to me that he had a light, supercilious air, with 
an eye that roved over-much, and a thin-lipped curved 
mouth that reminded me of “Pinky’s” “rosebud.” 

The ladies who accompanied him were very fine birds 
indeed, in very fine feathers ; but neither among them nor 


178 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

among the young ladies in the west transept who came 
in a body, and who, Nora informed me in a whisper, 
were from Miss Somebody’s school, did I find a single 
one that for beauty and grace could at all compare with 
Barry. 

“Here comes the processional!” whispered Nora to me, 
in the slight confusion caused by its entrance, and then, as 
the end of it came in sight, “Yes, Dr. Strachan’s going to 
preach.” 

Whereupon once more I had to look sharply, for of this 
man also I had heard much. 

“I’m right in the midst of the Family Compact,” I said 
to myself, wondering, almost, that these men looked like 
ordinary kindly citizens instead of like ogres and raven- 
ing wolves as my boyhood fancy, in earlier years, had 
pictured them. 

“Keep an open mind,” my father had said before I left 
home, qualifying it with “But, mind you, don’t get swept 
off your feet,” and so, when the service was over, which I 
had much ado to follow, and could not have followed, with 
credit, had it not been for Nora’s surreptitious tuggings 
at my coat-tail and nudgings against my arm, I settled 
down determined to miss no word of the sermon. 

I may here note that “The Honorable and Right Rever- 
end John Strachan, D.D.” is a somewhat short man, with 
a rather fine head and a very unaffected manner, not at 
all the sort of personage one would expect to see riding 
about in a grand coach fit for the Pope, and living in a 
mansion which is a real palace compared with any other 
house in Toronto. I saw it the other day, when down by 
the bay, and admired it much, and especially the very fine 
grounds which surround it. 

Nor when he preached could I see anything amiss with 
his doctrines, or anything that could have offended even 
fThe Schoolmaster himself. To all appearance he was just 
a man of great common sense, who argued — without much 
eloquence, it is true — for a sane, well-regulated life. When 
Jhe sermon was over, and I tried to sum up what The 


AT ST. JAMES’ 179 

Schoolmaster would have thought of it, I knew he would 
have said that it lacked “vision.” 

As for me I have no great knowledge of these things, 
and less experience, and so, perhaps, am no rightful critic. 
But it was hard for me to connect the reverend doctor with 
the Family Compact’s doings in the fashion in which I have 
heard him represented. 

On the way home Uncle Joe walked with me. 

“Well, boy, what did you think of the discourse?” he 
asked. 

“I liked it very well,” I said. 

“What! And you didn’t get even a glimpse of horns 
or hoof?” 

“Never a glimpse,” I laughed. “If the Reverend Doctor 
has them he keeps them pretty well covered.” 

Evidently my uncle admires the Rector with all his 
heart. 

“There isn’t a man of more ability in the place !” he said, 
quite enthusiastically. “There’s no mollycoddle parson for 
you, with eyes rolled up and tongue dingin’ out ancient his- 
tory until ye’re scunnered with it, and no interest at all in 
anything but the Church ! ... Is there anything to be done 
about the hospital, he’s there. ... Go into the schools al- 
most any day in the week and you’ll likely find him there. 
... Is there a patriotic meeting called, he’s right on the 
spot. ... Is there a knot in the Legislative Council that 
needs to be untied, he’s the one to do it. Yes, that’s a fact, 
and don’t you smile, you young devil, or by the powers 
I’ll knock you off the sidewalk!” 

At that I burst out laughing. 

“I wasn’t smiling, sir,” I said, “not even a little bit.” 

He gave a little “Ahem !” and I saw that his merry blue 
eyes were twinkling. 

“You weren’t, hey? All right. You see I thought I’d 
get me foot in it again. I know the sort of pap you were 
brought up on, me boy, politically speaking. Ginger and 
pepper, by Jove! Pap flavored with ginger and pepper! 
That’s a good one, but you know what I mean. . . . Now, 


i8o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


to return to the Doctor, — he’s feathered his nest, of course. 
But he’s a financier, man, — a financier ! How many of ’em 
wouldn’t do it, with his ability? Tell me that? And it’s 
the same with a lot more of ’em that that damn little 
scallawag Mackenzie’s been railing at for the last ten years ! 
They’re financiers, man, — financiers! And they’re build- 
ing up this city ! There isn’t a man in Upper Canada bet- 
ter for Toronto than this same little man you heard preach- 
ing this morning!” 

“I quite believe it, Uncle,” I said, “but what about the 
rest of the country?” 

“Oh there’s a lot of rapscallions all over the country 
that ’ud be making a howl anyway,” he said. “You can’t 
put city advantages out into the backwoods in the wink of 
an eye. Lord bless you,~man, a country has to grow! It 
has to grow, sir ! But some of ’em want to run a Marathon 
before they’ve well learned to creep. . . . One thing about 
your father, Alan, he’s more reasonable than lot’s of ’em. 
We come to blows, politically speaking, he and I, every 
time we meet, though it hasn’t gone any further than that 
yet, thank the Lord ! — he could roll me around like a plum 
pudding. But he at least has the sense to stay home and 
not go traipsing about on platforms, or waving a fool 
motto in a procession. Tear an’ ages, Alan, but it sets me 
rampagin’ to see those fool mottoes ! They make me know 
just how a bull feels when he sees a red rag walloped about 
just to tantalize him.” 

“Father always kept clear of being very radical in any- 
thing,” I said. 

Uncle Joe nodded. 

“He’s Scotch,” he said, “and canny, thank the Lord! 
And I’m glad to see, boy, that you’re a little like him in 
that respect. Keep your eyes open, my boy, and make up 
your own mind about things. . . . You’ll meet more of 
’em — these black-hided devils, I mean — while you’re in the 
city. Octavia and I’ll have to give a few dinner parties 
soon to get even. But I think you’ll not find ’em such a 
bad sort after all.” 


AT ST. JAMES’ 181 

And then he raised his cane, which was clicking along 
over the stone flags, and made believe to poke me with it. 

"But by the Lord, young fellow,” he added, “if you dare 
to open your yap and get off any radical stuff at my dinner- 
parties I’ll disown you! That I will!” 

Which alarmed me not at all, for my uncle is good 
enough often to lead me to talk politics with him, young 
though I am, and indeed, finds it hard to keep long off the 
subject, albeit he has lost his temper once in a while and 
berated me soundly. His tempers, however, are like a 
flash in a pan, and he has never failed to apologize after- 
wards, telling me that he wouldn't give a fig for me if I 
hadn’t opinions of my own. 

I hold it much to his credit, too, that he has never ques- 
tioned me as to the drillings in our district, although he 
knows that such are afoot all through the country, as does 
almost everyone here. Indeed it seems to me almost pa- 
thetic to think of The Schoolmaster and the boys practic- 
ing away after nightfall in the little hole in the woods and 
fancying themselves all part of a great secret, while the 
whole movement is known here and even laughed at by 
the Government. It may be, however, that The School- 
master fears more the interference of Big Bill and the 
scamps he goes with beyond the Village. 

I have taken occasion to question my Uncle, too, as to 
what the leading Reformers here have to say about it all, 
and especially Mister Baldwin and Doctors Rolph and 
Morrison, all of whom he knows. They, too, he says, 
though far from being satisfied with the way that things 
are being conducted by the Government, take no very great 
account of “Little Mac’s” doings, and, indeed, rather dis- 
sociate themselves from him, while pressing the justice 
of much that he affirms. 

“But, of course,” concludes my uncle, “there must be 
such differences of opinion, so long as there are two polit- 
ical parties,” — which sounds to me as though he considers 
that opinions are manufactured by political parties instead 
of the parties being created by opinions. This, I fear, may 


1 82 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


be sometimes the case, and all the more do I see it since 
coming to this place. 

“Why don’t you try to get more into public affairs, Uncle 
Joe?” I asked him the other evening, as we sat before the 
fire in the living-parlor. “Why don’t you run for the As- 
sembly ?” 

“I’ve no taste for the like at all, my boy,” he said. 
“Twenty years ago I decided to give my life up to healing 
sick bodies, and I’ve never regretted it. I have found a 
work that needs all my time — and more if I could find it. 
Sometimes I’ve wished I had ten bodies instead of one, so 
that I could send them all on the job. Besides, boy, I’ve no 
talent for politics — ‘statesmanship’ ’s a word I like better. 
I’m too likely to lose my head — in everything except the 
doctoring, — and I’m no speaker, although,” and his eyes 
began to twinkle, “I can express myself with fair em- 
phasis on occasion.” 

I laughed, but said nothing, and he continued to puff 
at his pipe for a moment. 

Then, the merry mood upon him again, he turned to me, 
taking his pipe from his mouth and holding it at arm’s 
length. 

“Of course,” he said, “if ever the Assembly needs a 
valve to let off the steam, why I might apply for the job.” 

“I understand, sir, it’s a stormy enough spot, at times,” 
I said. 

“You’re right, my boy, You’ll have to attend some of 
the sessions. It’s all a part of your education. Perhaps, 
some day, you’ll be able to do what your uncle can’t.” — 
Then, suddenly recollecting himself — “But by gad, (sir, 
you’re on the wrong side of politics !” 

A few moments ago, after finishing writing the above, 
I put out my candles and went to the window and looked 
out at the bay, this night all moving restlessly like some 
troubled living thing, and all flickered with silver, al- 
though darker than the land between because of a light 
covering of snow that has fallen upon the withered grasses. 


AT ST. JAMES’ 183 

But not long was this picture present with me, for the 
external eyes become blind and refuse to see when the 
eyes of the memory and the imagination begin to work. 
And so it was that shortly I was looking, not upon the 
restless bay and white ground, but away over the dark 
hills and forests, — on and away until my soul hovered first 
above the Golden- Winged Woods, then saw the dear farm 
with the little home in the heart of it, dark in the night 
save for a flickering glow at the tiny window. The next 
instant, through the window, I saw my dear father and 
mother. In imagination I pressed my face against the 
glass and beheld them sitting there, side by side, before the 
fireplace, in which my father had piled logs until the flames 
filled the cavern and lighted the little room, playing 
most of all on the sweet face of my mother, crowned by its 
ripple of brown hair. She was stringing wild apples for 
the drying, and my father was coring them and making 
them ready for her, and although their lips moved I could 
not hear what they said. 

After that a sadness fell upon my heart, and I knew that 
the memory of Barry was creeping into it. Where was she 
this night? Was she happy and well-cared-for ? Why had 
she passed me as I slept, without other sign than the dear, 
yet tantalizing pateran that stopped ere it had well begun? 
... I saw her again clearly as I had ever seen her and 
heard her laugh. There in the Golden-Winged Woods 
was she, with her crimson scarf and flowing hair all bound 
with the little vine of green. And then she disappeared, 
and I saw only the misty troubled bay and the ghostly 
snow. “Some day she will come to this place/’ I said to 
myself, as I had said a thousand times before, and I knew 
that until that day I must still keep watch, looking into the 
face of every woman, and straying into every place where 
people congregate. Me, perhaps, she will never want, yet 
some day it may fall to me to be her friend. 

Turning from the window I lighted my candles once 
more, that I might write this. Now I must go to my bed 
but I fear I shall not sleep. 


CHAPTER XIX 


THE WAY THE WIND BLOWS 


HIS afternoon I am writing my journal in the little 



A office of the apothecary shop, the reason being that in 
the first place all the other work which Uncle Joe left me 
has been done, and in the second that the day is so stormy 
no one is coming in. Through the window I can see the 
sleet and snow coming down in a steady drive, lashed at 
times by the wind so that it beats against the glass like a 
shower of hail-stones. No wonder the streets are quite 
deserted. 

For my own part I am very glad of the storm, for there 
is much that I wish to set down in my book, the chronicling 
of events having become a sort of diversion to me, so that 
I miss it, if I am long hindered from it, as I would any 
other enjoyment or source of comfort. Both of these my 
journal has become to me. In writing the occurrences that 
have given me joy I live them over again, while in re- 
cording those that have given me sorrow I seem to find 
relief such as one might find in pouring out one’s woes to 
a dear friend. 

Today I have so much to tell that I scarcely know where 
to begin, and yet I must proceed somewhat in order. 

To begin with, since last writing, just three days ago, 
I have had two surprises, — -but of that in due time. 

There is a chap next door whose name is Clinkenbocker. 
He is substituting for a few months for the clockmaker, 
who has gone home to the Old Country on a prolonged 
matter of business, and although for upwards of three 
weeks we have spent our days so near that we have run 
into each other at every turn, we have had but little to do 
with each other until yesterday. 


184 


THE WAY THE WIND BLOWS 185 

At first sight of him I thought of a sea lion, which I 
once saw slithering about and “honking” without ceasing 
in a tank at a traveling circus, and to me, ever since, he has 
been “The Sea Lion,” so much so that I have been in mortal 
terror of accosting him some morning with “Good morning, 
Mr. Sea Lion,” or calling to him “Say, Sea Lion, will you 
give me the right time of day?” 

He has a big head with beetling brows, beneath which 
his eyes look out at you in curious fashion, and his mus- 
taches are so heavy and long that they droop down in a 
curve right below his choker. 

At first I tried to be friendly with him, as is the custom 
of us plain folk from the country, but it was soon enough 
clear to me that he regarded me with either dislike or sus- 
picion, and I did not find out the reason until yesterday. 

“Good morning, Mr. — er — Clinkenbocker,” I would say to 
him. 

“Morning, sir,” he would snarl, and immediately dive into 
his shop among his clocks and watches. 

“Good luck to you, sir; is the swimming fine?” I would 
fain have called to him many a time, but then reflected that 
he would have lost the point of my joke. I do declare, how- 
ever, that the fellow’s fishiness got so on my subconscious- 
ness that I would not have been surprised any day if I had 
heard him “honk.” 

Well, yesterday evening, after supper, I returned as usual 
to the apothecary shop, and was about to shut up for the 
night when there came a tapping at our back door. I opened 
it and there stood the Sea Lion. 

“Are you about through, sir ?” he said, in his deep growl- 
ing voice. 

“Just going to shut up,” I said. “Is there anything I can 
do for you?” 

It seemed to me that he looked friendlier than usual, and 
in his countenance there seemed to be a gleam of something 
that looked perilously like animation. 

“Yes,” he said, abruptly, “I’d like you to step into my 
workshop for a few minutes.” 


I U THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


With my eye I measured him up and down, and a good, 
thick, stocky specimen he was. ‘‘What’s up now, old fel- 
low?” I said to myself. “Well, here goes! I guess I can 
look out for my skin as well as you can for yours.” 

So in I went. 

The place was very dimly lighted with but a single tallow 
candle, and at first I saw nothing but the little speck of red 
flame in the midst of a jungle of ticking clocks, short and 
tall. Then from the long dark shadows of them someone 
stood up, taller and taller, and at the next breath I had taken 
one bound across the shop, sending a lot of loose wheels 
and things clattering from something that I bumped against. 

It was The Schoolmaster. 

“Highty-tighty !” he exclaimed, and then he thumped me 
on the back and nearly wrung my hand off, and I swear I 
could have hugged him. 

“Where did you come from? When did you get here? 
How are they all at home?” I asked, all in a breath. 

“Slowly, boy, slowly!” he laughed. “One at a time! — I 
came straight from the Corners, at least as straight as the 
very bad roads would allow. I got here an hour ago. They 
are all perfectly well at home, and I am the bearer of a 
letter to you. There,” taking it out of his pocket, “sit down 
and read it.” Which I did without stopping to make 
apology, finding it filled with all the little home happenings 
that I most wished to hear about, and ended with the few 
words of love that I well knew how to measure. 

While I read The Schoolmaster and Clinkenbocker con- 
versed in a low tone, and when I had at last finished they 
both turned to me, The Schoolmaster with a glad smile, the 
Sea Lion with a twinkle beneath his bushy eyebrows that 
promised to develop into one with proper coddling. 

“And you were here a whole hour !” I said, somewhat re- 
proachfully. 

“You’ll forgive me,” said The Schoolmaster, “when I 
tell you that it was only a few minutes ago that I learned 
you were next door. I asked the way to your uncle’s and 


THE WAY THE WIND BLOWS 187 

my friend here had a chance to tell me you were nearer to 
me than I had thought. ,, 

“You saw father and mother ?” 

“Of course. Just before I left. When I have time to 
turn out my carpet bag I’ll get you some warm socks from 
your mother, and give you all her warnings about what 
you are to do in case you take cold.” 

I laughed, and then I thought of Barry. 

“There’s no especial news?” I asked. 

“None at all, — no, nothing in particular. I’ve been try- 
ing to get Jimmy and Hannah to come down to The Cor- 
ners for the winter, but there’s difficulty, of course, about 
housing the oxen and the cow and pigs and hens. . . . Red 
Jock’s fine — working long and late these days. . . . Big 
Bill’s drinking harder than ever. You didn’t know Nick 
Deveril had married his housekeeper, did you? A wild 
old charivari the boys gave him ! He’s so mad over it they 
say he’s going to move away soon. There’s some talk of 
Big Bill renting the tavern — in which case ‘Good-bye Bill.’ 
Too bad, too! There’s some good in the fellow if only 
he’d leave the drink alone.” 

“And what about Old Hank?” I demanded. “What’s he 
doing these days?” 

“Why, bless my soul, how did I forget Hank ? Why he’s 
in fine fettle. I’ve a letter from him too — a whole roll — 
so I put it in my carpet-bag. He’s fine, fine! But busy, — 
very busy ! He’s been helping with the drillings, you know. 
A born soldier, that boy ! Takes to it like a duck to water !” 

“A born orator, too,” I added. “Hank’s got a head on 
him, hasn’t he?” 

The Schoolmaster nodded, in his quick way. “A fine 
head ! A fine head ! There’s a boy that’s going to get to 
the top some day, in Canada — and especially if our plans 
carry out successfully.” 

I glanced at the Sea Lion, but he was sitting with his 
hands clasped over his stomach and his eyes on the floor, 
as motionless as an iceberg on the edge of the Polar Sea 
and about as expressive. “He must be ‘one of us,’ ” I said 


1 88 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


to myself, and then I must have drawn down my brows in 
perplexity, for I felt, at that moment, as if, somehow, I 
had deserted the ship. And yet, I consoled myself with 
thinking I had done but as everyone had wished me to do. 

The Schoolmaster laughed, evidently misinterpreting my 
scowl. 

“Oh, Clinkenbocker’s all right/’ he said. “You needn’t 
look so fierce.” 

At which I made haste to disclaim, “I wasn’t thinking 
of him. I was wondering whether I should have stayed at 
home with the boys.” 

The Schoolmaster waved his hand genially. “Not at 
all! Not at all! You’re just where you ought to be. If 
things come to a head one of these days, as we expect, 
you can easily throw yourself in where you can be of 
use.” 

“You think, then ” I began. 

But he cut me off. “Oh, something’s bound to happen, 
before long either.” 

He glanced at our companion, and my glance followed. 
The Sea Lion had straightened up, and was sitting with 
his hands on his knees, chin protruding and eyes glaring a 
bit. 

“Do you know,” laughed The Schoolmaster, “my friend, 
here, had put you down for a dyed-in-the-wool Tory. 
Naturally, of course.” 

The glare relaxed to a twinkle, and the long, drooping 
mustaches twitched. And then the Sea Lion held out his — 
flapper — which I shook with right good will. But never 
a word did he say. a 

“He tells me,” went on The Schoolmaster, “that the town 
never was in better shape for being frightened out of its 
seven senses, and that he imagines the Lieutenant-Governor 
may be intimidated, although so far he has shown no sign 
of fear and is very stubborn, — more stubborn than ever.” 

“Stubborn ’s the devil !” came in a deep growl from be- 
hind the mustaches, so suddenly that I almost jumped. 

“I was out at the Garrison, not long ago,” I said, “and 


THE WAY THE WIND BLOWS 189 

certainly there were very few soldiers there. As you know, 
the troops are all withdrawn to Kingston.” 

The Schoolmaster nodded, and I swear that I began to 
feel most uncomfortable, being a spy appealing not at all 
to my notion, so that I began to wonder just how much I 
might say without being traitorous to my new friends, while 
still remaining faithful to the old. Thus came to me, 
strangely enough, perhaps, for the very first time, a realiza- 
tion of the position in which I had placed myself, and 
Hank’s words on that June day in the mill flashed back to 
me, “Look out lest you sit down between two stools.” 

For a few moments so confused was I, in trying to place 
myself, that I quite lost track of the conversation, and 
heard not a word The Schoolmaster was saying, although I 
knew that his voice was going on. Then my mind seemed 
to clear itself. “If the worst comes to the worst,” it said 
to me, “throw yourself in on the side of principle. Re- 
member, ‘The greatest good to the greatest number.’ Act 
on the square and you will be all right.” Yet I hoped that 
The Schoolmaster would not put me in an embarrassing 
position. 

I need not have feared, however, for before long I could 
perceive that he was careful to ask me no questions at all. 

“Clinkenbocker tells me,” he was saying, when I came 
back to myself, “that the young men continue to drill under 
Colonel FitzGibbon.” 

“That they do,” I replied. “More than once I have 
been invited to join them, and have had to tell them I am 
a Reformer. One of them asked me ‘What damned differ- 
ence that made so long as I intended to stand up for my 
country and the British Crown?’ That looks to me to 
have some reason in it.” 

Again The Schoolmaster laughed. “So you’ve had to 
confess up to being a Reformer. — Well, an open confes- 
sion is good for the soul.” 

“Of course,” I said, “one can’t be totally discredited for 
that, even among the Tories, so long as such men as Rolph, 
Baldwin, Morrison and Bidwell are in the place.” 


1 9 o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“Grand men ! Every one !” exclaimed The Schoolmaster. 

“Best in the land !” growled the Sea Lion. 

“You know/’ I said, hesitating, then thinking no harm 
could be done one way or another, “that the Government 
and all this place knows all about the drillings ?” 

The Schoolmaster moved a bit uneasily, and coughed. 

“Yes,” he said, “I have heard so. I have even heard — 
don’t ask me how — that the purport of the turkey and 
pigeon matches is well known, and that Sir Francis Bond 
Head and his advisers make merry over the whole matter, 
thinking the preparations all a mere bluff for political pur- 
poses.” 

“And are they not?” I asked, rather sharply, looking at 
The Schoolmaster, but conscious of a quick shuffle on the 
part of the Sea Lion. 

“I do not need to tell you, Alan,” replied The School- 
master, slowly, “that actual fighting will only be resorted 
to as a very last resort.” 

“Of course,” I assented, then glanced at the Sea Lion, 
He was leaning towards me and his eyes seemed fairly 
to gleam in the half-gloom. 

“You’re with us?” he asked, booming the words out in 
a muffled roar. 

“I have never been against you,” I said, but The School- 
master took the words from me. 

“I told you before, Clinkenbocker,” he said, “that you 
could trust him or any of his name as you could your own 
soul.” 

The Lion grunted, and sank back into his chair again. 

I turned to The Schoolmaster. 

“And now tell me the news,” I said. “You know I have 
been hearing only the other side for the past three weeks.” 

“Why,” The Schoolmaster said, pulling at the long black 
wisp of hair over his forehead, “where shall I begin ? Did 
you know that Mackenzie left for the North about the end 
of the first week in November?” 

“I did not know.” 

“Of course, up Yonge Street is the very hotbed of the 


THE WAY THE WIND BLOWS 191 

movement,” he went on. “Lount, Matthews, Gorham and 
others have been very busy there. In fact, the greater part 
of the — the delegation — is expected to come from there. In 
the West, too, as you know, Dr. Duncombe has been most 
energetic. I believe, too, there is some talk of having 
Colonel Van Egmond assist actively. ” 

“Colonel Van Egmond!” I exclaimed, remembering well 
the kindly gentleman who visited us last spring. 

“Yes. He’s an old man, but he has military tactics down 
to a science. We have to be prepared for possibilities, you 
see. Besides, his very name lends, lends — prestige — to the 
demonstration. Just as the names of Doctors Rolph and 
Morrison do. I hear that Mackenzie has been able to use 
their authority up North.” 

With that I got up and began to pace the floor. 

“And I have heard,” I said, feeling myself on thin ice 
indeed, “that Doctor Rolph and Doctor Morrison do not 
wish to connect themselves with the movement in any way.” 

“All Tory talk!” growled the Lion. 

“No doubt,” acquiesced The Schoolmaster. “There are 
no more steadfast opponents of the unjust domination of 
the Family Compact in this country, than those same gen- 
tlemen whom you named a few minutes ago as being the 
upholders of the dignity of the Reform party — the real pa- 
triots of this Canada.” 

Then he turned to the Sea Lion. 

“By the way, Clinkenbocker, what did you do with those 
Swift’s almanacs?” 

The Sea Lion got up and moved about among the clocks 
until he found the booklets, which he handed to me. 

“Gives ’em the devil !” he growled, with satisfaction. 

“Let me see them,” said The Schoolmaster. “Here, read 
this. It sets forth pretty well exactly what’s what, what’s 
needed, and what we’re after.” 

And I read: 

“The control of the whole revenue to be in the people’s 
representatives ; the Legislative Council to be elective; the 
representatives in the House of Assembly to be as equally 


i 9 2 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

proportioned as possible; the Executive Government to in- 
cur a real responsibility ; the law of primogeniture to be 
abolished; the Judiciary to be independent ; the military to 
be in strict subordination to the civil authorities ; equal 
rights to the several members of the community ; every ves- 
tige of Church and State Union to be done away ; the lands 
and all the revenues of the country to be under control of 
the country; education to be widely , carefully and impar- 
tially diffused; to these may be added the choice of our 
own Governor ” 

“I daresay this is all very good,” I said, handing the 
Almanac back to The Schoolmaster. “Although part of it 
I do not understand very well. I’ll be glad to keep the 
book to study it better, if Mr. Clinkenbocker will permit 
me. 

He growled assent, then picked up the other booklet, 
labeled 1834, and turned over the pages. “Read that,” he 
said, and so I read again: 

<( The backwoodsman, while he lays the ax to the root 
of the oak in the forests of Canada, should never forget 
that a base basswood is growing in this his native land, 
which if not speedily girdled will throw its dark shadows 
over the country and blast his best exertions. Look up, 
reader, and you will see the branches ” — and here followed 
the names of nearly every prominent Tory family in 
Toronto, which it is not necessary here to set down. <( The 
farmer toils ” the paragraph ended, “ the merchant toils, the 
laborer toils and the Family Compact reap the fruit of their 
exertions 

This last I read aloud. 

“Gives ’em the devil!” reiterated Clinkenbocker. 

“Rather personal, that,” commented The Schoolmaster, 
“but personalities seem to be the fashion in the Colonial 
press these days. There’s more truth than nonsense in it 
though. You know, Alan, who are the men who are amass- 
ing wealth in this country. ‘They toil not neither do they 
spin, and yet Solomon in all his glory’ — well, you know 
all about it now, Alan.” 


THE WAY THE WIND BLOWS 193 

“Who gets out this ‘Patrick Swift’s Almanac ?’ ” I asked. 

“Why, Mackenzie, of course. That’s very well known,” 
replied The Schoolmaster, then, glancing about, “By Jove, 
Clinkenbocker, here a round dozen of your clocks tell me 
it is eleven of the night, and you haven’t even asked me if 
I have a mouth on me.” 

The Sea Lion got up with alacrity. 

“Fact ! I forgot,” he explained, simply, and then he 
trundled about and brought beer and bread from a cup- 
board, and a great ham on a platter from which he cut 
huge slices, laying everything on a table decorated by 
clocks along the back. 

“Pull up,” he commanded, and then we set to and made 
havoc with the viands, the talk, meanwhile, returning to 
the affairs at home, than which no other topic just then 
could be so interesting to me. 

After that I went with The Schoolmaster to The Sun 
Tavern, where he was staying for the night, going about, 
to make the walk a little longer, past Doel’s brewery, which 
stands a little behind John Doel’s house, and which I never 
pass without looking at it with curious interest, since it has 
been there that so many secret meetings of Mackenzie’s 
followers have taken place. 

Elliott’s tavern, “The Sun,” I looked at also with renewed 
interest as we approached it, The Schoolmaster having re- 
counted to me the manner in which the “Declaration of 
Independence of Upper Canada” was here drawn up, and 
adopted afterwards at a meeting at the brewery. Doctor 
Rolph, it appears, was to some degree a party to the 
first drafting of the paper, which called chiefly for meetings 
to discuss the remedy of grievances, as has since been done. 
The tavern, by the way, is not one of the fashionable stop- 
ping places in the town, but is a comfortable, though ugly, 
square building, clap-boarded and painted white, with the 
sign-board which indicates its name swinging before the 
door. 

“Come in,” said The Schoolmaster, “and I’ll find you 
Hank’s budget,” so I went in while he went through his 


,i 9 4 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

carpet-bag, carefully lifting out each article and laying it 
aside until he had found the little packet. 

Upon that I made haste to go home and was at first 
surprised to find the house quite brilliantly lighted. Then 
I remembered that Uncle Joe was having a midnight supper 
for some of his cronies, to which he had been good enough 
to invite me, but which invitation I had declined, knowing 
the company to be so much older than I. 

As I passed through the hall shouts of “The Queen! 
The Queen !” were arising from the dining-room, and glanc- 
ing through the open door as I went up the stairs I could 
see the men standing with glasses raised high above their 
heads so that I trembled for the liquor; but of that I have 
no doubt they took proper care. 

“The Family Compact!” I whispered to myself softly, 
having recognized some of the company. “So the festivi- 
ties are just beginning!” And then I closed my door and 
proceeded to devour dear old Hank’s letter, which was filled 
with some sense and a good deal of nonsense, interspersed 
with a score of questions about “the city” and a few trite 
remarks on the political situation — for Hank is a born 
politician. (“Statesman!” — I correct myself !) 

Notwithstanding the sounds of hilarity from below, I 
soon fell into a heavy sleep, from which I was awakened at 
heaven knows what time by Uncle Joe, who came in with 
a candle, a little disheveled in his evening dress, and in- 
clined to be talkative. Uncle Joe is not a drinker, as 
drinkers go, but on occasion he takes enough to loosen his 
tongue a bit more than necessary. 

“So that damn rebel Mackenzie ’s up north again raising 
the devil !” he said, holding up his candle and looking down 
at me as I blinked and tried to collect my senses. 

“I don’t give a continental for Mackenzie,” I said. “For 
heaven’s sake go to bed, Uncle Joe! What time is it?” 

But he continued on his verbal way, unruffled by my 
desires. 

“I only heard of it tonight,” he said. “The damn little 
gtir-the-mud ought to be locked up !” 


THE WAY THE WIND BLOWS 195 

“If there wasn’t any mud,” I mumbled, “there’d be 
nothing to stir up,” but, fortunately perhaps, Uncle Joe did 
not hear me. 

“He ought to be locked up!” he repeated, “and every 
other damn disloyal cur with him!” Then, suddenly, he 
put down the candle and made off down stairs. 

I was just about to put out the light when I heard him 
coming up again, and presently he appeared at my door 
carrying two wine-glasses, brimming full. I could have 
died with laughing at the look of him, for I didn’t have to 
go round a corner to see what was coming. 

“Here, you young rapscallion,” he said, “drink to the 
health of Her Majesty the Queen, God bless her! Drink, 
you young rapscallion, drink !” 

And so I sat up in bed and took the glass, and drank with 
him to the health of the Queen, which I could do with right 
good will. But an odd enough brace we were, I do say, — I 
with my hair on end, in my night-shirt with red bindings, 
and he in his rumpled evening dress, with his ruffled shirt 
pulled out over his vest and a wisp of such hair as he has 
left standing out straight over each ear, so that they re- 
minded me of the tufts of a wildcat in the bush. 

With that he was satisfied and went away, while I, thor- 
oughly awake now, reflected on the evening’s occurrences. 
And then I saw very clearly, and do now see, that the 
whole trouble in this country comes of lack of common 
experience and the difficulty of getting a common point of 
view. 

These men in Toronto — “financiers,” feathering their own 
nests, no doubt — are not unkind, personally. They are 
good fathers and good friends, and the most of them are, 
in many respects, gentlemen. Nevertheless they seem to 
possess the fault of thinking that “All’s fair” in government, 
as in “love” and “war.” Having had no personal experi- 
ence out among the working folk on the farms and in the 
forests, they find it quite impossible to understand and to 
sympathize, and so they act selfishly and even put burdens 
upon the people that, for many of them, make life a misery. 


196 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

In this even the Assembly’s skirts have not been clear, for 
last year they made appropriations for $4,000,000 to be 
spent on roads, harbors, lighthouses, the completion of the 
Welland Canal and other items — all good things in them- 
selves, but which have meant a pressure of taxation that 
our people are, as yet, ill fitted to bear. Nor are the con- 
temptible methods forgotten, which at that election were 
resorted to, to secure everywhere members of the Assembly 
who would be tools in the hands of the Council and the 
Executive. 

Upon the other hand, too many of these men of whom 
I have spoken, think all who arise in condemnation of “the 
Government” are “rebels,” and “disloyal,” whereas that is 
a great mistake. There may be a few radical enough to 
desire “independence,” and, for all I know, perhaps union 
with the United States, but I am very sure that upon the 
whole the Reformers are not at all against Britain, and 
are quite as loyal as the Tories, being only against the abuses 
that have crept into this country, and that are worse than 
ever since Sir Francis Head became our Governor. Even 
as they drill, I am sure that the great majority do not 
look for actual use of their arms but only for intimidation 
of the Government so that grievances may be removed. 

Of this last, however, I have not been authorized to 
speak freely, — outside, of course, of my journal. 

The storm still rages, with the sleet still slashing at the 
pane. 

A few moments ago Clinkenbocker brought me a huge 
mug of beer. Verily we are becoming great cronies ! 

I foresee a spice of adventure in his acquaintance. 


CHAPTER XX 


A DISTURBING APPEARANCE 

T HIS morning the day broke bright and clear, with a 
sharp nip in the air, and frost glittering on the very 
light coating of snow. 

At breakfast Nora and Kate proposed a ride, to which 
I readily assented. Since coming here I have had very little 
riding, not only because of the necessity for staying rather 
closely in the apothecary shop, but because of the state of 
the roads, which, except early in the morning, when hard 
frozen, have been sloughs of slush and mud, even in the 
streets of the town itself, so that one can well understand 
the name that has become affixed to the place, “Muddy 
York.” 

Needless to say the traffic has been greatly interfered 
with. It has been impossible for the farmers to drive 
in from any distance at all, while even the stages on the 
main roads have met with divers accidents and have been 
arriving at all sorts of unseasonable times, so that almost 
at any hour of the night or day, at the Coffin Block where 
they stop, one may see them drawing up, covered with 
mud, which has besplashed the commodities hanging out- 
side so that they look like barnacles on a ship, — the horses 
weary and steaming and mud besplashed also, while a few 
weary travelers alight and make haste to secure a good 
meal and a place to rest. 

The past few days, however, have been much better, 
the snow having fallen to a few inches' depth, so that the 
sleighs have been coming in and the streets and market 
begin to look alive. 

“The roads must be good now," said Nora, and then there 
197 


198 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

was some discussion as to whether we should go out along 
the Indian road up the Humber past the King’s Mills, call- 
ing at the garrison, on the way, for Pinky, or whether we 
should go up Yonge Street or out the Kingston Road, in 
either of which case I must first go out for Pinky, which I 
could do finely while the girls made themselves ready. 

Perhaps because of my influence the decision was made 
in favor of Yonge Street, which I have not yet seen for 
any considerable distance past the town, and about which I 
have been curious through having heard so much at home 
of the doings “out Yonge Street,” and about Hogg’s Hol- 
low and the Holland Landing and other points. 

Accordingly I fetched Pinky, finding him at the garrison, 
although the place seemed deserted even more than usual; 
and soon we were all away to the North, Nora and I gallop- 
ing ahead, while Kate and Pinky loitered behind. 

As one leaves King Street, following Yonge Street, the 
city becomes more and more scattered, often with consider- 
able land between the buildings, until at last the building 
lots lose themselves in ravines and woodlands and farms. 
The chief landmarks along this way seem to be taverns, 
for besides the “Sun” and the “Red Lion,” which I have 
before mentioned, there are also the “Gardiner’s Arms,” 
with its troughs and pumps, the “Green Bush,” whose sign 
is a painted pine tree, and “Montgomery’s.” 

Past all these we clattered at good speed, the road being 
quite smooth and hard from the traffic of the sleighs, and I 
was pleased to note the splendid horsemanship of my cou- 
sins, who sit their saddles as well as men, and who look 
particularly well in their long floating habits and neat riding- 
hats. 

Nora’s cheeks glowed red as roses, and not a thing along 
the way missed her. She knew who lived here and who 
there, and even when we reached the woods-covered hills 
could tell, although the leaves were off, which trees were 
elm, or butternut, or beech, or basswood, or maple. In 
these woods, she told me, grow many wild fruits, including 
wild currants and gooseberries as well as raspberries, while 


A DISTURBING APPEARANCE 199 

along the Don flats there is sport to be had in summer with 
shooting grouse, quail, snipe and wild ducks. Should one 
desire a change, she said, one could fish from the river 
banks, or go spearing salmon at night from boats with 
“jacks” or pine-knot torches at their bows. Upon the 
whole, she thinks, I should plan to stay here all of next 
year, but I think that when spring comes the drawing of 
the old home will be too great. 

And now I come to the part of my narrative which tells 
of something that has somewhat disturbed me this day, for 
I have written thus far without any great pleasure in it. 

Upon our way back it was proposed that we come in by 
the College Avenue, and so we made a detour, coming pres- 
ently to the Tecumseh Wigwam which stands at the corner 
of the Concession Line and the Avenue. It is but a low, 
one-story log cabin, but is supposed to be very exclusive, 
being frequented only by “young bucks” as Uncle Joe calls 
them, who gather there to drink and roister. Even on Sun- 
day the place is resorted to, which causes much criticism 
among some of the Methodists, — not at all, however, to the 
discomfiture of the “young bucks.” 

The road being good, we were riding past the place at 
a gallop, when I saw two young men entering the door. 

One of them, I could have sworn, was Selwyn, and with 
a sudden impulse I checked my horse back until I threw 
him almost on his haunches. 

At the moment I would have thrown myself off and fol- 
lowed the men in, then it occurred to me that I must have 
better excuse than I possessed for going into the place, or 
for accosting Selwyn even though it chanced to be he. 

I do not know why it is that the presence of this man 
always makes me feel vaguely uneasy, or why I always 
connect Barry with him. I feel that he was honest that 
night in the forest, and yet 

Well, some day soon, perhaps, I shall meet him — if, 
indeed, it were he — and have opportunity of speaking with 
him. 


200 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

Heigho ! — I must stop. Kate has come to ask me to go 
down, because Anne and Pinky are there. 

I know how the evening will be spent. Percival will 
twirl his mustache and look things unutterable at Kate. . . . 
Anne will be very uninteresting, but will look very sweet 
and pretty in a blue gown with a very wide skirt and sleeves 
puffed to the elbow. She has great soulful brown eyes and 
pretty reddish hair which she parts in the middle and draws 
into a cluster of little puffs behind. Sometimes, in the 
evening, she wears a thin gold chain about it, with a jewel 
that hangs in the middle of her forehead. Her waist is 
very small and so are her feet. . . . Nora will be the 
rollicking one, and by and by a troop of her admirers will 
come in, and there will be much chaffing and laughing, 
and no doubt before the evening is over one of them will 
invite me to join the “Home Guard” regiment. 

By the way we have all received invitations — very ele- 
gant things in white and gold — for a masque ball that is 
to be held at a fashionable dancing hall on the Monday 
night, November the 27th. 

I wonder how I shall acquit myself. 

At every spare moment Nora and Kate are putting me 
through the dances, — the polkas and schottisches, galops 
and what not — as well as they can, and they even intend to 
ask enough of their friends in so that I may become as 
familiar as may be, before the event, with the lancers, and 
cotillions, and quadrilles as they are danced “in polite soci- 
ety” as Kate says, rather suggestively. 

For all this kindness I am very grateful. 

Also this household is quite excited over a great dinner 
that Aunt Octavia and Uncle Joe intend giving on the even- 
ing of December the 4th. 

But now I must go down. Kate will think I am dis- 
respectful. 

Au revoir. Journal. 


CHAPTER XXI 


A REVELATION” 

I T is two o’clock of the morning, but I cannot sleep, and 
so I have taken my Journal to see if by writing in it all 
the events of this disturbing day I can by any means secure 
respite from tossing about on my bed with imaginings that 
have almost driven me mad. 

This morning Clinkenbocker asked me if I would care to 
go with him in the afternoon to a pigeon match out Yonge 
Street, to which I gave ready assent provided Nora would 
substitute for me in the apothecary shop, which she can 
well do if she chooses. I wished to go, not because I care 
anything for trap-shooting, which has always seemed to me 
a cruel sport, but because, since the invitation came from 
Clinkenbocker and I well knew the purport of any such 
pigeon match as he might take me to, there was promise 
of some sort of adventure. 

Adventure enough I had, truly, but far from the sort I 
had expected. 

Riding out as soon as we could get away, we found the 
affair already in course, in the barnyard of a farm, where 
were gathered a number of men in the rough homespun 
clothes which I know so well. Bearded fellows the most 
of them were, and bronzed from constant exposure to the 
sun of summer and the blasts of winter ; and as they stood 
about or sat in various attitudes on the piles of boards and 
logs, forming a sort of semi-circle beyond which were the 
traps, a constant fire of chaffing and laughter ran round 
among them, so that one might have thought they had not 
a care in the world. On the very outskirts of the crowd 
were a few Indians, who kept by themselves, some of them 
very gayly bedecked, as is their fashion. 

201 


202 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


For a time I watched the shooting, pitying the pigeons as 
they flew up and circled about, their pretty white and 
iridescent bodies fluttering about against the gray sky like 
bits of down-fallen cloud, only to be hurled at the next 
moment on the ground, bleeding and limp, all their beauty 
and love of life destroyed. Nevertheless, there was some 
good marksmanship, and in spite of my sympathies I found 
myself interested in the “shots,” and in the keen-eyed men 
who winged the little leaden missiles so accurately. 

By and by came Clinkenbocker’s turn, and it amused me 
much to see how nimble the big fellow could be, and how 
he drew bead on the poor flying birds with unerring aim, 
even after he had let them escape so far that they were in 
excellent chance of safety. 

My turn was to have been next, but an utterly unforeseen 
thing happened. 

While looking about at the men, wondering who was this 
one and that, and whether there would be conversation 
afterwards, and how much I should hear — for The School- 
master had departed preoccupied and silent, as though he 
had learned too much of import to care to talk with a lad 
such as I — I noticed one of the Indians, who were sitting 
on a wagon — detach himself and come over across the yard, 
a dog at his heels. 

He was a mere lad, and it seemed to me that there was 
something familiar about his manner of walking, although 
I did not in the least place him. Towards me he came, 
keeping behind the circle of men, his face all the while 
hidden by a slouched hat very gaudily bedecked with bead- 
work and feathers. As he passed me, however, he glanced 
furtively up. 

“Why, Joe!” I exclaimed. 

He paused and I joined him, and together we walked 
behind the barn. 

“Where did you come from?” I asked. 

Without speaking, he pointed to the North. 

“And where are you going?” I continued. 


A REVELATION 


203 

He pointed again, toward the Southwest. “Big Wig- 
wams,” he said. 

“Oh, of course. Where the noisy water pours into the 
lake,” I said. “You’ll be staying there for the winter. 
Where have you been all summer?” 

Again he pointed to the North. “Many moons there,” he 
replied. 

“And were the ‘munedoos’ (spirits) good to you?” 

He nodded. 

“Big water — much fish,” he explained. “Then Pepoonah- 
bay come, (the god of the North, who makes the winter). — 
“No good. — Come back.” 

“I looked for you much, Joe, when the leaves were fall- 
ing,” I said, hastening to come to the thing that was in my 
heart. “I wanted to find Wabadick or you to learn if you 
had seen or heard of ‘Oogenebahgooquay.’ ” 

Quickly he looked at me, his face alight. 

“You saw her, Joe?” I asked. 

“Oogenebahgooquay come to wigwam ! Buy new clothes ! 
Go away then !” 

“What clothes? Tell me, Joe?” I demanded, catching 
him by the arm, at which he drew away, so that I feared 
I had defeated myself, and had to use some tactfulness be- 
fore he would talk again. 

“Whose clothes?” I begged at last. “Tell me all about 
it, Joe. You know I love Oogenebahgooquay, the wild rose 
woman, and I want to find her and be good to her. Tell 
me about the clothes, Joe.” 

“Clothes — me,” he answered, pointing to himself. 

“Your clothes?” 

“Clothes — me. New clothes,” he repeated. 

I stared at him stupidly. 

For I do not know how long I stood as one stunned, 
trying to collect my thoughts, yet conscious all the while 
of the worrying crack, crack of the rifles on the other side 
of the barn. Then, as in a flash of clear light, understand- 
ing came to me. I saw the dim forest by the spring. I 
heard Howard Selwyn’s voice. I saw him come down to 


204 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

the water — : and I saw the Indian lad who accompanied him. 

And then all the fury in my body arose against this man 
who had come between me and my girl, and my very eyes 
went blind as I wondered what had become of her, — while 
all the while came the crack, crack of the rifles just over 
the barn. 

I think my face must have gone white, for when I came 
to myself Joe was watching me curiously, though motion- 
less as a figure hewn from stone. 

“Where did she go, Joe?” I asked, but I scarcely knew 
my own voice, so heavy and thick was it. 

“Oogenebahgooquay no tell,” he said. 

“I must find her,” I said. “Joe, will you help me?” 

He gave a grunt of assent. 

And then I went to the fence where my horse was tied, 
and loosed him, and sprang to his back and set off on a 
mad gallop, with only the one thought in me — to find 
Howard Selwyn. Further than that I could not go. 

But at perhaps a quarter of a mile away it occurred to me 
that this mad riding might be misconstrued by those— 
“rebels” — whom I had left behind, and so I turned and 
galloped back, to find, indeed, some of the men grouped 
and looking towards me, with Clinkenbocker in their midst 
evidently much relieved at my return. 

“Come here, Clinkenbocker. I want to speak with you,” 
I said. 

And so he came close to me, and the group of men went 
back to the trap-shooting, and I told him that I had just 
heard of a dear friend who, I feared, might be in need of 
me, so that I must go at once to find her. 

In my distraction I said “her,” and perhaps it was well 
I did so, for a look of comprehension came upon the Sea 
Lion’s countenance, and I think he saw I was much dis- 
tressed. 

“Oh, is it your girl?” he said. “Go on then.” 

Thus dismissed, I set off again, nor did I halt until I 
had drawn up at The Wigwam and asked for Howard 
Selwyn. 


A REVELATION 


205 

But not a soul was there who knew where he was. He 
had gone away, they said, on the night before, without 
leaving any word in regard to his plans. 

After that I rode to every hostel in the town, beginning 
with “The Mansion,” which is the most likely stopping- 
place for such as he; but he had been at not one of them 
all. 

And so I came home here to my uncle's. 

But my search has begun again, and this time it will not 
be checked. 

I would not work this Selwyn harm if he is innocent ; but 
if he has done aught to crush my girl — my Oogenebahgoo- 
quay, my wild rose woman — he will answer for it. That I 
swear ! 

In vain my reason tells me that she fled from me, that 
she does not want me. I will find her. I will know that 
it is well with her. My little wild rose ! 

Have I missed her already in this place? Looking into 
the faces of the girls only, have I missed her? Has she 
gone by me, in her lad’s clothing, and I have not known ? 

The thought drives me mad. Henceforth I must look 
into the faces of the lads as well as the lasses. 

And when I meet with Howard Selwyn he will explain 
or have it out with me. We shall see whether he can 
take — and crush — the roses, without finding the thorns. If, 
indeed, he has crushed 

Now do I know my distrust of him. In my ears rings 
his voice, “Pluck the roses while you may,” and the music 
of his chanting, “Love sought is good, but given unsought 
is better.” 

And yet how can I wonder that Barry fell under his spell 
when I myself have felt it. All unsought she may have 
given her love, poor child! — But does Howard Selwyn 
know how to guard and cherish unsought love — however 
sweet and pure it may be? 

That I will know. 


CHAPTER XXII 


SELWYN 

I HAVE met Howard Selwyn! He is still in this city! 

This evening at shortly before sundown I had occasion 
to pass the residence of the Lieutenant-Governor, when I 
saw a party of ladies and gentlemen assembled before it, 
mounting to horseback, with much talk and merriment, and 
evidently assembled for some evening outing, the roads 
being now hard-frozen again after the rain and slush that 
followed on a sudden change of weather two days ago. 

As I went by I noticed that one of them was Selwyn, and 
before I knew what I was doing I had dashed to his horse 
and caught it by the bridle. 

He had been talking to one of the ladies, but with that 
he whirled about and raised his whip as if to strike me. 
Then, apparently he recognized me, and let it drop, and 
asked me what I wanted. 

So I went close to him and asked him if he knew anything 
of Barry Deveril. 

These were the words he said: 

“My dear fellow, I have much more to do than go 
about the country keeping track of Barry Deveril for you.” 

But as he said them I felt that he was making an evasion, 
for he looked annoyed, and put the spurs to his horse so 
that it sprang off before I could by any means hold it, but 
could only look after him as he joined the party, who were 
waiting for him at a short distance, all of them then clatter- 
ing off with much talk and laughter. 

For a moment I stood there dazed, in the middle of the 
road. — Then I turned and walked and walked, far past 
the Garrison, wherever a path in the snow afforded footing, 
trying to get hold of the ends of all this tangled skein and 

206 


SELWYN 


207 

devise some means by which I can find the truth about Barry 
and learn where she now is. 

Evidently Howard Selwyn will not tell me, unless 

Well, twice he has slipped from me. The third time he 
shall not. 

And now it is midnight. I can write no more. And yet 
I cannot rest without doing something. I think I shall go 
out again and walk. 


\ 


CHAPTER XXIII 


THE “PATRIOTES” 

T ODAY all the talk here has been of the outbreak in 
Lower Canada. 

Some days ago the news came that a small party of 
British troopers who were bringing two French Canadian 
disturbers of the peace in to Montreal had been set upon 
by a party of “rebels” and put to rout, the two prisoners 
being liberated. 

It now appears that a much more serious collision has 
taken place — and with disaster again to the regulars. 

All day today the wildest rumors have been flying about, 
and no doubt there are many exaggerations, but as nearly 
as we can make out the following are the facts : 

That because of the increasing hostility of the habitants 
to the Government, an order was issued to arrest the leaders, 
Papineau, Dr. Wolf red Nelson, Thomas Brown and Ed- 
mund O’Callaghan, who, it is said, fled to the very heart of 
the disaffected district, Richelieu; that for the protection 
of these men the habitants gathered in force at the villages 
of St. Denis and St. Charles ; and that, accordingly, Sir John 
Colborne sent out troops with cannon, under Colonel Gore, 
to disperse them and quell what now promised to be serious 
insurrection. 

Three days ago, it appears, these troops, after a hard 
journey because of the mud and rain, having traveled all 
night from Sorel, arrived at St. Denis before daybreak, 
only to find their way barred by a stockade and the place 
strongly fortified, with the habitants standing at defense 
in great numbers. 

As they neared the place the church-bells gave the alarm, 
208 


THE “PATRIOTES” 


209 

and fighting speedily began and continued for a great part 
of the day; after which, being run out of ammunition, the 
regulars were obliged to retire, leaving their dead and 
wounded behind them. 

Of the habitants , it is said, a great many were killed; but 
that this is only the beginning is very clear, for already 
steps must be almost completed for sending a great body 
of troops from Montreal, if not from Kingston also, to go 
out and bring the place into subjection. 

What will be the effect on the people scattered all over 
the French Canadian country no one can tell; and we are 
all wondering what will follow in our own Province. 

Uncle Joe is disturbed and testy, and — perhaps because 
of recent talks with Colonel FitzGibbon — is now much in- 
clined to think that actual rebellion here may take place, 
even imagining he has always thought so. Colonel Fitz- 
Gibbon, of whom my Uncle thinks much, deeming him a 
high-minded gentleman as w T ell as a far-seeing loyalist, has 
long apprehended such a possibility, and, besides training 
young men himself (of these there are not now more than 
thirty or forty), has urged precautions on the Government. 
But so far he has been regarded, for the most part, as an 
alarmist, Sir Francis Bond Head persistently affirming that 
there is no danger of an outbreak in Upper Canada, and 
laughing, whenever there is talk about him, at Mackenzie, 
whom he regards as a wasp buzzing about in a bottle. In 
this opinion the men associated with the Lieutenant-Gover- 
nor seem to concur. 

“ I suppose you’ll admit now, sir,” said Uncle Joe to me 
at dinner today, “that more than 'political pressure’ is in 
the wind.” 

“I have never pretended,” I said, “to know anything of 
the state of affairs in Lower Canada. I have never been 
there.” 

‘Til tell you what I believe,” he returned, thumping with 
his knife-handle on the table and glaring at me, “I believe 
that damn little rebel, Mackenzie, ’s hand in glove with 
them — That's what I believe. . . . Talk to me, sir, of your 


2io THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


'patriots !’ They’re damn rebels, every one of them, in this 
Province as well as in Lower Canada! They’re rebels! 
My God, man, it’s rank treason that’s been going on, right 
among us! And we’ve shut our eyes to it! That’s what 
we’ve done! We’ve shut our eyes to it!” 

I opened my mouth to remonstrate, but he shut me up. 

“Oh, you’re as blind as a mole, too,” he said. “You 
needn’t tell me that all the drillings and the devil knows 
what not that’s been going on in this country’s been for 
nothing! In my country when one man shakes his fist 
at another every day for a week it’s shillalehs at the next 
go. And it’ll be the same here. I tell you it’s rank dis- 
loyalty to the British Crown, — that’s what it is ! And that 
stuff that Mackenzie’s been getting off his press for heaven 
knows how long’s rank treason, and ought to be stuffed 
down his. throat! — Talk about smashing up his printing- 
press ! Huh ! It should have been smashed up every time 
it was set up in type !” 

All this poured out in a torrent, while everyone at the 
table sat silent, and Aunt Octavia, who loves brightness at 
meal-time, looked worried and almost tearful. 

Having a goodly spice of Uncle Joe’s own Irish in me, I 
might have taken up the cudgels, but Nora shot me a warn- 
ing glance, and so I refrained. For as well as she knows 
do I know that my Uncle, while hot in the temper, has 
one of the biggest hearts that ever throbbed with the breath 
of life, and would be one of the very last to carry out any 
of the dreadful threats that he sometimes brandishes, being 
always inclined, when it comes to the pinch, to err on the 
side of leniency. 

But I have found that in regard to the things that are 
happening of late, it is of no use to talk with him. “Trea- 
son! Disloyalty!” These are the words past which he — 
and most of the people whom I have met here, for that 
matter — cannot see. Since they have never lived in the 
bush, they can by no means realize the hardships that must 
be put up with. And for that I do not altogether blame 
them ; for now, having had experience of two kinds of life, 


THE “PJTRIOTES” 


21 1 


I begin to understand that very seldom can people feel that 
through which they have not actually passed, nor, indeed, 
can as a rule arrive at an absolutely unbiased judgment. 
For this reason, it seems to me, the public man who is likely 
to be of greatest use to the world, must be the one who 
has gone through the greatest number of experiences. And 
so even Poverty and Hardship, with all their ugly faces, 
may be to some the very truest friends that could be devised, 
and the most helpful in the long run. 

Heigh-ho, I wonder much what will be the end of all 
these happenings anyway. 

And now to my own affairs. 

As yet I have not again encountered Howard Selwyn, 
and, indeed, my first excitement having worn off, I begin to 
wonder whether I was not over hasty in jumping to con- 
clusions, and whether he was not speaking truth when he 
left me to infer that he knew nothing of Barry Deveril. 

I have learned that he is now staying at the Mansion 
House, and tomorrow, I think, having now gained com- 
mand of myself, I shall try to see him, that I may ask him 
if he can tell me aught of his Indian guide. It seems to 
me that surely, if I make open confession, he will under- 
stand and will talk with me. I do not forget that there 
have been times when I have felt that he has a kind and 
even loving heart. 

This evening has come home from the tailor’s my suit 
which I am to wear to the masque ball tomorrow night. 
Kate and Nora planned it. I am to go as a King Charles 
Cavalier, and the girls go into much ecstasy over the fine- 
ness of my appearance when arrayed with cloak and feather. 

But I take little interest in it. How can I be pleased with 
such frivolity when I know not where is the little “Indian 
lad” who masked for such a different purpose, yet who is 
so very dear to me, and who may be suffering I know not 
what discomfort or unhappiness? For it may truly be, as 
my mother once said, that the girls who go in search of 
adventure rarely find happiness, but often sorrow, and 
bitter tragedy. 


CHAPTER XXIV 


THE DISCOVERY 

T HIS is Sunday night, and again, after a day of aim- 
less roaming about despite the efforts of my cousins 
to engage me, I am sitting in my room whose windows look 
out upon the bay. 

An eventful week has been this, for I have found my girl ! 
Yes, found her and lost her again. 

— Or did I find her? 

— For one brief hour I looked upon her face and heard 
her voice, yet all the while knew that it was but the tips 
of the wings of this dear butterfly that had flitted back to me 
that I touched, and that the dear one herself hovered just 
beyond my reach. — My Barry and yet not my Barry, — smil- 
ing upon me, sweet and true as of old — yet withdrawn, and 
proud and mysterious. 

Into my life she came, for one brief opening of tHe 
gates of heaven; out of it she has gone again; nor do I 
know today better than before what was her history during 
those long weeks of absence, nor whether she is happy at 
this time, nor what are her plans for the future. 

Of one thing only am I sure — that Howard Selwyn 
wished me to believe a lie ! Not man enough to face things 
at their worst, he evaded me and fled from me, and now — 
but of that later. My anger so rises even at the name of 
him that if I permit my thought to dwell upon him I cannot 
write ! 

I found her on the night of the ball, in the very least 
likely place I could have looked for her, and the manner of 
it was this : 

At somewhere between eight and nine of the clock we — 
212 


THE DISCOVERY 


213 

my cousins, Uncle Joe, Aunt Octavia and I — in a coach 
which Uncle Joe takes out only upon state occasions, ar- 
rived at the door of the dancing hall, where the ball was 
to be, and where full sign of festivity had been set forth 
in a double row of torches set to form an avenue to the 
entrance. At each side of this avenue, behind the torches, 
a crowd had assembled to see the masquers arrive; but I 
might have paid but little heed to them had it not been 
that one of them lurched a little forward as we walked 
towards the door. 

Looking at him, I was surprised to see none other than 
Clinkenbocker, who, moreover, seemed to be making sign 
that he wished to speak with me. 

Knowing that something important must be afoot else 
he, of all people, would not be in such a place at such a time, 
I immediately excused myself from our party and made 
way to him. 

At once he drew me a little back from the crowd, so 
that we were in the darkness; but, despite my curiosity to 
know what he might be about, I turned to look, for a 
moment, at the scene, which was so strange to me. At that 
moment I would that I could have painted it : the shawled 
heads; the motley crowd of faces shifting in and out of 
the darkness behind the red light of the torches, some hard, 
some vacant, some merely curious or merry ; the dark, mov- 
ing bodies; and all forming two swaying, living walls, be- 
tween which, as the coaches rolled up and stopped at the 
sidewalk, passed the laughing procession of gayly-dressed 
masquers ; the men caparisoned, for the most part, in dress 
of the olden time, with slashed coats, tri-corne hats, pow- 
dered perukes, knee-breeches and buckles, while the women, 
robed in all- the gay colors of the rainbow, swept by with 
the soft rustle of silk or rich quietness of velvets. Above 
the long dominos one caught a glimpse, here of Queen 
Elizabeth frills, and there of a shepherdess' crook and 
wreath; or here a big Gainsborough hat surmounting a 
shower of curls, and there a towering Marie Antoinette 
head-dress. Everywhere from behind the masques of black 


214 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

velvet, that looked eerie enough in the red flare of the 
torch-light, shone bright and laughing eyes. 

Looking at the one people and then at the other, some- 
how the thought of the French revolution crossed my mind, 
and I was about to turn to Clinkenbocker, to remark upon 
it, when my attention was distracted again by a very gay 
clattering of bells and prancing of horses. It was the caval- 
cade of His Excellency, the Lieutenant-Governor, his coach 
preceded and surrounded by gentlemen on horse-back, while 
grooms rode behind to take the horses. 

As these new arrivals passed up the avenue, the crowd 
on each side jostled and pushed to get better view, but 
because of my height and a slight rise of the ground where 
we stood, I could see very well, oven to catching the glitter 
of jewels and soft shining of rich furs. For a moment I 
looked on in smiling curiosity, and then almost started, for, 
in the very midst of those immediately following the Gov- 
ernor, I perceived the tall and graceful figure of Howard 
Selwyn. In spite of his mask I recognized him, and knew 
him for the handsomest man of them all. 

“Aha!” thought I, “and so we are to breathe the same 
atmosphere this night, Mister Selwyn! I wonder if, once 
more, I shall meet you.” — And then, so quickly do memory- 
pictures flash before the mind’s eye, I saw him again . . . 
in the tavern ... in the woods by the spring . . . and on 
the rock at the end of the rapids, where he had tossed the 
coin to me and I had flung it back at his feet. 

When the last of this party had passed within the en- 
trance, I recollected why I was standing thus, an on-looker, 
and turned to the Sea Lion. He was there beside me, 
awaiting my pleasure, as usual quite motionless, and, indeed, 
almost invisible against the dark wall had it not been for 
the sharp curve of his mustache like a black scimitar across 
the dull glimmer of his face. 

“I’ve kept you waiting,” I said. “Well, what is it, Clink- 
enbocker ?” 

But he did not as first answer me. 

“You’re very fine,” he growled. 


THE DISCOVERY 


2i£ 

“Yes,” I said, “fine feathers make fine birds, don’t they? — - 
But a bird’s a bird for all that.” 

“I know,” he said, understanding^. — “You’ve got to go.” 

“Well, you know,” I returned, “I rather like all this, 
too.” 

“You’re young,” he responded. 

But I could not stand there philosophizing with the Sea 
Lion. Inside of the door, below the long stairway that, 
apparently, led tp the ballroom, I could see Nora and Kate 
waiting for me, recognizing them, in spite of their masks, 
by their costumes, for Nora had appareled herself — out 
of compliment to me, she said — as a Lady of the gay Stuart 
period, with ruff and stomacher, very gayly bedizened, while 
Kate had elected to represent herself as a calla lily, a 
choice which gave her a chance to discard her crinoline ; — 
right well she knows how graceful she is when not so 
hampered. As they stood there, with their cloaks thrown 
back, talking with some very dashing young men, I could 
see a gleam of the yellow of Nora’s bodice and the white 
lilies that Kate carried in her very beautiful hands. 

“What is it, Clinkenbocker?” I repeated. “I must go in. 
My cousins are waiting for me.” 

“Next Monday night,” he said, lowering his voice until it 
was but a whisper in my ear, “some of us are to meet over 
Anderson’s store — the watch-maker’s, you know. Will you 
come?” 

“Why ” I began, recollecting the dinner-party to be 

at my Uncle’s that night — but no more did I say, for, chanc- 
ing to glance back at the crowd, I saw something that drove 
the thoughts from my brain and the words from my lips. 

Coming up between the two lines of on-lookers, quite 
alone, was a slight cloaked figure that I should have recog- 
nized anywhere in this world. It was Barry, cloaked and 
masked, but absolutely alone. 

At a stride, almost, I reached the edge of the crowd, 
pushing through close to the door, then I stood still. So 
close was she as she passed me that by reaching out an 
arm I could have touched her, yet perforce I spoke not a 


2 1 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


word, not even a whisper, but watched her as she went up 
the steps, with her head held very high and proud firm 
step, the light from the entrance shining on the soft curve 
of her chin below the black mask. 

Just within the door some other arrivals were showing 
their cards of invitation. Reaching them she stopped, but 
while I watched to see her draw hers forth, suddenly she 
whirled about and made way back between the lines of peo- 
ple to the sidewalk, then turned sfiarply to the left. 

With that I dashed behind the crowd and after her, all 
oblivious to curious eyes, — my cousins, the ball, everything 
forgotten. But by the time I reached the sidewalk she was 
already well away from the spot, hurrying almost precipi- 
tately, down the Market Street. 

By the time the lights were well left behind, however, she 
was but a few paces ahead of me, and at the first darkness 
I saw her snatch the mask from her face then walk on again 
more slowly. 

Now I felt myself justified and so overtook her. 

“Barry ! Oh, Barry !” was all I could say. “Barry, dear 
child !” 

And then she stopped still, and gave a glad little cry, and 
reached forth her two hands to me, and I caught them 
and pressed them to me, saying still only “Barry ! Barry !” 

So we stood looking into each other’s faces, and I took 
the mask from my face also, and in the darkness we looked 
into each other’s eyes. There was no torch here, nor any 
light, but the kindly glimmer of the snow shone for us, 
and in truth I know that we needed no more to illumine 
our own souls’ shining. 

Just for a moment, thus, and then she drew away a little 
and began to walk on again. 

“I am so glad to see you, Alan,” she said. “So very 
glad to see you,” — laughing a little. 

With that my tongue was loosed. 

“I have waited for you so long, Barry,” I said, “and 
now you have come! I knew that some day you would 
come.” 


THE DISCOVERY 


217 

The words were spoken impetuously, but immediately I 
knew that I should not have uttered them, for she drew up 
a bit proudly and the distance between us, on the sidewalk, 
widened. 

When she spoke again, too, there was in her tone a light 
bantering, although there seemed a sort of feverishness in 
it also, so breathlessly and quickly spoken were the words. 

“And yet I have been near you once and again,” she said, 
laughing a little again. “Did you not find my pateran, 
Alan?” 

“At the cave?” I replied. “Oh, yes. But it was such a 
mocking little pateran, Barry. I think you were cruel that 
day.” 

Even in the darkness I could see her lips curve in a smile. 

“Cruel ?” she repeated. “But sometimes, you know, peo- 
ple must pass like ships at sea.” 

“Even old friends?” I asked. 

“Even old friends,” she repeated. 

Then for a little space we walked on without speaking. 
At last I ventured. “Where are you staying, Barry ?” 

And with that something of her old self seemed to come 
back to her. 

“Why,” she replied at once, “do you remember Red Jock's 
Elizabeth ?” 

“You don't say you're with Elizabeth!” I exclaimed. 

“Yes, with Elizabeth — Mistress McPherson,” she said. 
“And, Alan, she’s just as sweet and good as dear old Jock 
thinks her, — and the children, too! She says she does not 
know you. You must let me have you meet her.” 

“Are — are you going there now?” I asked, feeling, some- 
how, that I was treading on delicate ground. 

For a moment she hesitated, then she replied, readily 
enough, “Yes,” adding, — “But you can’t come?” as she 
glanced at my cloak caught so gayly on one shoulder, and 
my broad hat with its feather flapping in the wind. 

“I can go with you,” I said, “and shall, if you will let 
me. The ball doesn’t matter in the least, Barry. I see 


21 8 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

friends from home so seldom that I can’t afford to let them 
slip through my fingers.” 

Cold words they were; but how could I say other while 
I realized that, in spite of her friendly words, she had, 
in a moment, thrown up a wall between us, invisible, yet 
impenetrable as adamant and insurmountable as the heav- 
ens ; for there is no wall so dense or so high as that which 
creeps up between two who have once been something more 
than friends. And the tragedy of it is, I fear, that they 
two add to it, brick upon brick, even while they hate them- 
selves for doing so. For Pride and Misunderstanding are 
steady builders ; and cold looks, and hard tones, and averted 
heads, and cruel silences are the bricks with which they 
work. But sometimes they use building materials that are 
less tangible even than these — things that can be felt with 
poignancy though neither named nor described. 

Of such last was the wall which now stood between 
Barry and me. Looking at her I saw the aloofness of her, 
and marked the independence of her step and all the with- 
drawn pride of her, — the more proud, it seemed to me, 
now that she referred, even so indirectly, to the ball. . . . 
Strange, almost equivocal, truly, had been her action of 
this night; but never a word did she say of why she had 
gone alone to the ball, or why, having reached the very 
door of the dancing room, she had turned and fled. 

For that I loved her. 

“You will miss so much,” she said; then with the old 
lightness, “Well, I want you to come home with me and see 
my masquerade dress. — But I unmasked too soon, didn’t I ?” 

“I should have known you, Barry,” I responded, “if you 
had been swathed in veils like an Arab woman. No other 
woman walks like you, Barry.” 

“Not even Mary Wabadick?” she said, and then we both 
laughed, for one day, long ago, I had told her she walked 
like little Mary Wabadick — which was true. 

It was on the point of my tongue to say that I had met 
Joe, the Indian, but the words died on my lips. I must 
wait until Barry herself told me that story. 


THE DISCOVERY 


219 

Turning from one street to another, she leading, so that 
I did not notice just where, we came to a place where the 
houses were small and scattered, and then stopped at the 
door of the smallest of them all. 

Tapping lightly, Barry opened the door and walked in, I 
following, into a little room in which a fire burned very; 
brightly. 

At once a woman arose from a low seat beside it, and 
when the introductions were over I saw that her face was 
very sweet. 

“Oh, yes,” she said, with the merest suspicion of a Scot- 
tish accent, “I have heard of you, over and over, and it's 
very welcome you are in my little home.” 

“I came back sooner than I expected,” remarked Barry, 
dropping into a rocking-chair, while Mistress McPherson 
drew out a larger one for me. 

“Yes,” said she, smiling. “Well, I always expect to see 
you — just when you come, Barry. Give me your cloak and 
hood. You are tired, child.” 

But Barry shook her head. “I’ll leave them on for a 
while,” she said. 

And then, seeing her for the first time in good light, I 
saw that she looked thinner than she had been, and older, 
somehow, and that a little red spot burned on each cheek. 

“You are cold,” exclaimed Mistress McPherson, heaping 
more logs on the fire. 

“You are ill,” I added. 

But she insisted that she was not cold, and that she was 
perfectly well. 

Afterwards there was a little time of indefinite talk about 
I do not know what — Red Jock came up, I think, and the 
children, and some odds and ends about the ball, — and then 
Mistress McPherson left the room and the two of us were 
alone together, Barry on one side of the fire and I on the 
other. 

For a few moments we sat in absolute silence, so that 
the crackling of the burning wood and the ticking of the 
tall clock in the comer filled the room. 


220 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

Then I looked at Barry, and Barry looked at me, and we 
smiled into each other’s eyes. 

“Oogenebahgooquay !” I said, and she smiled again. 

“Oogenebahgooquay — ‘the wild rose woman,’ ” she added. 
“Alan, you never forget.” 

Again we sat in silence, but presently she leaned a bit 
towards me. 

“Do you want to see my mask dress?” she asked. “See!” 

And then she threw back her hood, and I saw that her 
long black hair was loose about her shoulders and bound 
about with a little vine of green. 

And when she threw off the cloak, springing to her feet, 
there she was — Barry in her dress of buckskin color, with 
the scarlet sash about her waist! 

Then the walls fell down. 

“Barry!” I exclaimed, going to her and standing beside 
her; and I do not know what foolishness I might have 
said but that she drew away and pushed me from her with 
a little gesture that brooked no gainsaying, yet smiling all 
the while so that her eyes shone like two stars of evening 
above the glowing of her cheeks. 

Again I sat down, but closer to her, while she chose to 
drop down on a cushion on the floor, bringing her hands 
about her knees with the old gesture that I know so well. 

As she did so I noticed that she wore beaded moccasins, 
all worked with porcupine quills along the borders of them, 
— Such tiny, tiny moccasins they were ! I could have kissed 
them as they nestled about her feet. 

She was looking into the fire, at first smilingly, but pres- 
ently, gazing ever upon her dear face, I saw the fleeting of 
an expression there that I did not like. 

“Do you think I would have looked well in this at the 
ball?” she asked, and again there was a something in her 
tone, lightly though the words were spoken, that was not 
like Barry. Was it mockery? Was it bitterness? 

“I think you would have been the belle of the evening,” I 
said. “You do not need to be told that, Barry.” 

“And do you think,” she went on, banteringly, “that the 


THE DISCOVERY 221 

dancing up — up there — is as good as on a flat rock in the 
forest ?” 

“If you will come back with me,” I replied, ‘Til soon 
show you that. And HI have you meet my cousins and my 
Uncle and Aunt. They have heard of you, Barry, and 
love you already. ,, 

She shook her head quickly, throwing out her hands as 
though to ward off the suggestion. 

“No,” she said. “I prefer the flat rock in the forest. — 
The dear, old forest,” she added, lingering lovingly on the 
words. 

And then all the sweetness came back to her face as 
she asked about my mother and father and Hannah and 
Jimmy and the rest at the old home, and of how I had fared 
and what I had been doing since I came to the city. 

“You look very fine,” she said, as she looked me up and 
down, and then she rippled into laughter as I told her of the 
burly big Sea Lion who had said the selfsame words so 
short a time before. 

After that I waited, hoping she would tell me something 
of herself, but nothing of all that did she say, but sat there, 
looking at the fire, and then at me, and occasionally moving 
her fingers restlessly, which I did not like to see, for it was 
not Barry’s way. Often and often had I teased her about 
her “movelessness” and about mistaking her, in the Golden- 
Winged Woods, for a stump or a boulder, although I knew 
every stump and stone in it, nor could by any chance miss 
Barry, I often thought, if a drift of her breath came on the 
breeze to me. 

At last I ventured to ask the thing that was closest to me : 

“Will you be long in the city?” 

But to that she made quick reply, saying that she did 
not know; and turned her head quite away from me so 
that I could not see her face. 

In a moment, deeming this but play, I leaned forward, 
and caught a quivering of her chin. 

Impulsively I turned her face to me with my two hands, 
and saw her eyes brimming with tears. And then all my 


222 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


self-restraint flew to the four winds of heaven, for I caught 
her to me, and kissed her face and her hair, and poured 
impassioned words into her ears, telling her that never, 
never again must she leave me or we be separated. 

How brief was the moment in which she lay there in 
my arms — my one wild taste of heaven — I do not know. 
Then, almost dazed, I realized that, endowed with the 
strength of ten women, she had torn herself from me and 
was standing there, one hand on her breast, head thrown 
back, lips hard, her breath coming fast, eyes blazing at me 
as though she had been transformed into a young tigress 
at bay. 

“How dare you !” she said, between clenched teeth. 
“How dare you!” And I saw that her face was white as 
a winter sky. 

With that all my pride came back to me, and I held my 
head high as hers. 

“I have yet to learn, mademoiselle,” I said, “that a man 
insults a woman when he wishes to make her his honored 
wife,” — and I took up my hat to depart. Very proud was I, 
but how could she know that at that moment I felt my 
heart would break in two. 

Glancing back at her, as I reached the door, however, I 
saw her standing, sweet and penitent, two -tears coursing 
down her cheeks. And then I went to her and held out my 
hand. 

“Good-by, Barry,” I said. “You will at least bid me 
good-by ?” 

She looked up at me, and it seemed to me that her eyes 
held a world of woe. 

“Forgive me, Alan,” she said, putting her hand in mine. 
“It it not you I hate. It is — it is myself.” 

For a moment she hesitated, then when I would have 
withdrawn my hand she still clung to it, and I knew that 
she had something to tell. 

“Perhaps, in justice to you,” she began, “I should tell you. 
I — I have no right to— listen to such words from you, 
Alan.” 


THE DISCOVERY 


223 


“You mean?” I said. 

“I mean,” she replied, in a low voice, “I mean, Alan, that 
already I am a wife.” 

“A wife!” 

And with that all the world went black to me and I think 
I stammered again “A wife !” 

“Yes,” she said. “I am a wife, Alan. Forget me — dear 
friend.” 

“Is it Selwyn?” I muttered, my voice thick and, I fear, 
hard. 

Perhaps she saw the resentment in my face, for in an 
instant all her old pride seemed to come back to her, and 
she stood up very straight, head thrown back. 

“Yes, it is — Selwyn,” she said, repeating the word. “Sel- 
wyn — my husband and my — lover.” 

For one long moment I gazed into her eyes, seeking the 
depths of her soul, then in acquiescence I bowed my head 
and went to the door. 

“It is the end,” I thought, but when I sought to go out 
without further speaking her hand was upon the latch. 

“I am sorry you ever cared for me, Alan,” she said. 
“Believe me, I did not mean to make you care. I thought 
of nothing but comradeship in those old days. It seemed 
to me that your liking was just a romantic thing that would 
pass. — Alan, tell me that you believe me when I tell you 
I never tried to make you care,” — as though one could 
know her without caring ! 

“I believe you,” I said, and then once more we said good- 
by. But before the door had closed I added, 

“Remember, Barry, if ever anything happens that may 
leave you in need of a friend — we never know — come to me. 
Will you at least promise me that?” 

The shadow of a smile flitted over her white face. 

“I promise you. Thank you — dear friend,” she said. 
Then she pushed the door to and fastened the latch gently. 

And so I went out into the night. 

Since then Selwyn has left the city, and so has she. 


224 THE forging of the pikes 

I have seen Elizabeth and heard what she has offered to 
tell me. But I am assured that of the whole story she 
knows no more than I. 

Like a breeze from Heaven Barry has come and gone. 

As for Selwyn — for her sake I must let him go his way, 
even as he lets me go mine. 

When I think of him my fighting blood grows hot within 
me. I fear for her — for it is a sorry churl who will not 
proclaim his wife before all the world. — Yet for her sake, 
I can move no finger in anything that concerns him. 

She has told me that he is her husband ; but the mad 
questionings never cease. — Why did she come alone into 
the city, drifting into the little house with Elizabeth? Why 
did she go alone that night to the ball ? Where is she now ? 
Is Selwyn with her? Is she happy? 

It may be that the chapter — our chapter, hers and mine — 
has ended. — It may be that Barry once more may need a 
friend. — And she has given me a promise. 

Of Clinkenbocker since that night I have seen or heard 
nothing. The shop is closed, with the shutters drawn. 
The clocks have stopped ticking. 

What further did he want to tell me? Why was he so 
urgent and so mysterious? Where has he gone? What is 
to happen tomorrow night above Anderson’s store? — True, 
rumors have increased of late as to the activities of the 
“rebels.” Colonel FitzGibbon, they say, entered the Coun- 
cil Chamber of the Executive the other day hot and breath- 
less, claiming, because of information he had heard, to be 
fearful of early trouble. They say, also, that all the return 
he got for his pains was to be politely snubbed. Yet, also 
the story goes about that the Orangemen are to be supplied 
with the arms which were stored some time ago in the city 
hall, that the depleted garrison is to be filled with pensioners, 
and that steps are to be taken to fortify the city. Towards 
all this, however, not a move has been taken, and no one 
seems busy or agitated over the matter except the Colonel, 
who has made a list of people who may be relied upon for 


225 


THE DISCOVERY 

immediate help in case it is needed, and who has even gone 
from house to house to explain his plan, which is that in 
case of actual invasion the bell of Upper Canada College 
is to be rung, whereupon all the bells of the city shall take 
up the tune, all the men east of Yonge Street running, 
on that signal, to the City Hall, and all west of it to the 
Parliament Buildings. 

Upon the whole, however, people are not greatly exer- 
cised over these alarms, looking upon the Colonel as a 
choleric and excitable, though well-meaning, gentleman; 
and, indeed, he has complained with some heat to Uncle Joe 
of being rather openly given the cold shoulder, not only 
by the Lieutenant-Governor but also by Chief Justice Robin- 
son, whom most people consider of more weight in this 
place. 

Uncle Joe, of course, sides with him. As for myself, I 
find all this very interesting, and look forward, indeed, to 
some sort of demonstration, probably a long deputation of 
farmers and village folk armed chiefly with a petition. 

Nevertheless, I swear I should like to know what is to 
take place above Anderson’s store tomorrow night, and 
would go to see for myself had it not been that I have 
promised to stay home for the dinner-party. — Well, the 
Sea Lion will tell me all about it when I see him again. 

The dinner-party, by the way, is to be a very grand affair, 
with a company made up of nearly all the elite of the city, 
not even barring the Lieutenant-Governor — for whom, for 
some reason, Uncle Joe has no great liking. 

All week the house has been upset with preparations, and 
the meals fallen off in quality, and Sarah Jane, my Aunt’s 
serving woman, so excited and flustered, notwithstanding 
the extra help engaged for her, that Aunt Octavia declares 
she has broken half the chinaware in the kitchen. There 
are new gowns, too, in the making, and the women folk 
are so absorbed that the merry home life seems to have 
quite disappeared. 

All this, of course, I do not find overly pleasant, feeling 


226 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


somewhat in the way; nor does Uncle Joe, even though, 
forsooth, he was chiefly responsible for the party. 

Yesterday noon he came in quite out of temper after 
chasing about in the market for the best turkeys and geese, 
and through the fish-stalls for the best salmon and eels and 
whitefish, and grumbled that if he “lived to be one hundred 
and fifty years old there’d never be another party in this 
house !” 

“Well, my dear, it’s your own party,” remarked Aunt 
Octavia placidly. 

Whereupon he turned on her. 

“Tear an’ ages, madam, — can’t I have a party in my 
own house if I want it?” 

“Of course you can, my dear,” replied Aunt Octavia, 
smiling. “Aren’t we having it ?” 

Tw having it!” he declared, “rampaging around like a 
beastly butcher among fish and dead animals for the past 
two hours! I guess I know who’s having a mess of a 
time !” 

“But,” smiled Aunt Octavia, “you are such a good judge 
of meats and things, dear.” 

And then Nora told him he was tired and made him lie 
down on a couch, and Kate punched up the pillows for him, 
and little Mollie got his pipe and filled it with tobacco — all 
of which, I knew, was not to placate the dear man, but 
because he was really tired, for some other reason, and 
they knew it. 

Before bedtime the whole story came out, that he had 
ridden far put into the country to attend a man who had 
been hurt by an accident, and that he had rebelled at having 
to wait at the market because the scarlet fever had broken 
out among some of the little “foreigner” children, and he 
had been delayed possibly half an hour from going to them. 

This is my Uncle Joe. 


CHAPTER XXV 


Montgomery’s 

TT is now two weeks since I last wrote in my Journal, but 
no wonder I have forgotten it since so many things 
have come to pass. Scarcely, indeed, do I know where to 
begin this writing, but I judge my account will be easier 
to write, and therefore more lucid, if I follow the events in 
order from the beginning. 

At about five o’clock of the very next morning after my 
last writing, Uncle Joe was called out into the country on 
an emergency case, and I went down town, everything seem- 
ing the same as usual, with people going about leisurely in 
and out of the shops. 

At about one o’clock, all the rest of us were sitting at 
luncheon — Uncle Joe not having yet returned, and Aunt 
Octavia beginning to be uneasy about him — when the door 
burst open and in he came, quite breathless and excited. 

“Have you heard the news?” he said. “The rebels are 
gathering out North l” 

“What! Gathering out North!” we exclaimed. 

“That’s what they say,” he replied, taking off his coat 
and sitting down by the fire, quite forgetful of the fact 
that he should have been hungry. “I myself saw a fellow 
who had ridden in from heaven knows where to bring the 
news. His horse was all in a lather, but he was a long- 
winded beggar and it was hard to make head or tail of his 
story. Most of it was about how he had overheard their 
plans. But by all accounts the men from his district were 
to start this morning.” 

“Were you talking with him yourself?” asked Aunt Oc- 
227 


228 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

tavia, evidently somewhat alarmed, while the girls sat star- 
ing, without saying a word at all. 

“There was such a crowd about you could hardly get 
near him,” replied Uncle Joe, “and every time a new man 
came up he seemed to think he had to begin all over again. 
But I guess there’s something up, all right.” 

“Had he told Sir Francis?” I asked. 

“He had been there, but Sir Francis was out. I sent 
him to FitzGibbon. Ecod!” — and he chortled with amuse- 
ment in spite of his perturbation — “but the Colonel’ll t£ar 
his shirt this afternoon!” 

And so, indeed, it proved, for no man in the city was 
busier all that day and the rest of the week than Colonel 
FitzGibbon. 

Without waiting to take any more luncheon I went down 
to the shop, anxious to finish some work that had to be 
done, in case of anything happening later; but I must say 
it was hard to keep to business, for all the rest of the 
afternoon excitement grew apace. Even from the window, 
through which I glanced from time to time as I worked, I 
could see people gathering in little knots along the sidewalk, 
and customers dropping into the shop brought rumors that 
grew in direct ratio with the excitement, some saying that 
a thousand men from the North, with Mackenzie riding on 
a white horse, wr^ descending upon the City, while others 
averred that Dr. Duncombe was on his way in from the 
West with as many more, and that an army from the United 
States might be expected at his heels. Nor was there much 
more cohesion in regard to the aims of the rebels, for some 
declared that they intended to overthrow the Government 
and establish a Republic with Dr. Rolph as President, while 
others asserted that Dr. Rolph was having nothing to do 
with it whatever, but was still at his house, and that Mac- 
kenzie aimed at being President himself. Some there were, 
too, who pooh-poohed the whole of these stories, blaming 
Colonel FitzGibbon’s zeal for setting them afloat, and af- 
firming their opinion that the worst that would happen 
would be a procession with a petition. 


MONTGOMERY’S 


229 

Upon the whole, however, I was surprised that there was 
not even more alarm, for about as much interest seemed 
to center about the hanging of a girl that took place in 
front of the jail that day, for which crowds assembled, much 
to my disgust, for I cannot understand the morbid frame 
of mind that leads people to frequent such scenes. 

Finally, it became noised about that the Government was 
at last aroused, and that a warrant was out for Mackenzie’s 
arrest, and after that it seemed fairly evident that some- 
thing serious was afoot. 

I think it was about five of the afternoon when I heard 
a walking about in the clock shop next door, and, ifiy 
anxiety being now keyed to the breaking point, I went in 
by the back door, the Sea Lion’s gruff voice having called 
'‘Come in,” to my knock. 

“Oh, it’s you,” he said. “I just came back for some 
papers,” and at once he opened the desk and resumed the 
work of sorting out which, apparently, my entrance had 
interrupted. 

“For heaven’s sake, Clinkenbocker, tell me what’s up — 
if you know,” I entreated. 

He turned and looked at me for a moment in that way 
that always makes him appear as though he, the man him- 
self, were looking from behind some sort of frontal ram- 
part that did not belong to him. 

“Do you want to come along?” he asked, abruptly. 

“Come along where ?” I asked. 

“To help the cause,” he said. 

For just one instant I hesitated. Then it seemed as 
though a torrent that had gained impetus from all the e\ents 
of my past life was hurrying me along. The shop could 
go. The customers could go. Everything could go. Stand 
or fall I must stay with “the cause.” 

“Yes,” I said, “I’ll go with you. — Now tell me what’s 
up?” 

He was again bending over the desk, looking for some- 
thing, but he glanced at me and then back again. 


2 3 o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“They’re gathering at Montgomery’s tavern,” he said. 

“Who all? — Where from?” 

“All the patriots — from North, East, West,” he replied. 
“They’ve been coming in all afternoon.” 

— All the patriots ! — That meant Hank, The School- 
master, Jimmy, Ned, Dick, and the rest of the fellows! A 
glad excitement seized me, and I could have shouted with 
the joy of meeting them, being with them in any emprise. — 
Everything else was forgotten. 

“Are you going now?” I said. “I must lock up the 
shop.” 

He nodded, and I was off. When I came back he was 
turning the key in the lock of the desk. 

“What’ll I need? Are they taking guns? Have you 
one for me?” I asked, all in a breath. 

“There’ll be a gun at the tavern,” he replied. “What you 
need now is a good bellyful of supper. — Sit down there.” — 
And very obediently I sat down while he untied a parcel 
containing some bread and meat, and went to the cupboard 
and took out a bottle of beer. 

We ate until we could eat no more, which in my case 
was not long, so excited was I. Then the Sea Lion tied 
up what was left of the bread and meat and put it in his 
overcoat pocket. 

“Come now,” he said. 

We went out by the back door, and soon I perceived that 
he was proceeding by devious ways, with an appearance of 
leisurely going, although, in the dusk, I doubt if anyone 
much noticed us. 

Just once, until the houses became farther apart and there 
were fewer to meet, did our voices break the silence. 

“Where are we going?” I asked. “To Montgomery’s?” 

To which he rejoined rather sarcastically, “Of course 
not. — To Buffalo.” 

Then, by and by, approaching the Don bridge, we felt 
more freedom in talking, and he told me, in his jerky 
fashion, that he had been out giving notices — though pre- 
tending to take clocks for mending — during the week ; that 


MONTGOMERY’S 231 

the intention was to surprise the Government, and that 
Colonel Anthony Van Egmond, who was to arrive from the 
West, was to take charge of the patriot forces and direct 
operations in case of military action being necessary. 

“Colonel Van Egmond — my father’s old friend!” I ex- 
claimed. “But he’s quite old. He must be sixty years of 
age.” 

“Great soldier, though,” said the Sea Lion. — “Europe.” 

“I know,” said I. 

And then, once over the bridge, we followed westward, 
going by ravine and field and woodland, for there was 
scarcely any snow on the ground, just enough in the hollows, 
assisted by the stars, to give us a glimmer of light for our 
rough walk. 

“It’s turning very cold,” I remarked. “It’s been a won- 
derfully mild winter so far,” — thinking how well that had 
been for the folk at home. 

“Yes,” he said. “All afternoon they’ve been coming to 
the tavern in wagons, they say. It’s slower than sleighs, 
this time o’ year.” 

“You think,” I ventured, “that enough ’ll get there in 
time?” 

“Hope so,” he replied. “Too bad the day had to be 
changed. It’s unlucky. ’Twas to be Thursday.” 

“And this is only Monday,” I said. “Why was the date 
changed ?” 

“Don’t know. — Nobody knows. Some say Rolph did it,” 
he replied. “Must have been some good reason. Rolph’s 
no fool,” adding mournfully, “It’s unlucky.” 

“There’s more chance of a hitch,” I agreed, as we 
emerged from a bit of wood and climbed over a snake fence 
to a roadway. “But cheer up, old fellow. ... I say, are 
you sure we’ll get guns when we get there ?” 

“Hope so,” he replied. “Mine’s hid behind a fence.” 

“Why didn’t you get one for me, too ?” 

“Couldn’t,” he explained, laconically. “They might be 
on to me in the gunshops.” 

And that reminded me. 


232 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“After all, Clinkenbocker,” I remarked, as we strode on 
faster and faster, “we can’t surprise the City. Reports 
have been coming in all day.” 

In the darkness I could feel him glaring at me. 

“Where’s your soldiers ?” he growled. “And do you sup- 
pose there’s no Patriots in the city? Do you suppose there’s 
no one there but Tories? All week I’ve been warning ’em. 
All day today I’ve been giving ’em notice — the patriots. 
I’ve sat in my corner and kept the lists and sent the young 
fellows out to tell ’em. Colonel FitzGibbon’s been busy : 
Old Clink’s been busy, too.” 

And then I burst out laughing. 

“What are you laughing at?” he growled. 

“Oh, nothing. Imagine you, squatting there like a big 
spider, spinning your web !” 

At which he laughed noiselessly. He never laughs any 
other way. 

“We’ll give them the devil,” he said. 

“Is this Yonge Street?” I asked, presently. 

“Yes. We’re about there.” 

And then we trudged on in silence. 

A moment later someone called sharply: 

“Who goes there?” 

To which Clinkenbocker replied in a gruff syllable which 
I did not catch, so startled was I. 

“Pass!” came the order, and as we went on I saw dark 
forms of men along the fence at either side of the road. 

“One of the pickets,” muttered the Sea Lion, and a queer 
feeling came over me as I realized that in all probability 
I was to take part in a real rebellion. 

A few paces farther, looming up through the darkness, 
could be seen the huge outline of the tavern, and as we 
drew closer we could see, through the windows, that it was 
filled with men, as was also the yard behind and the road 
in front, where the hanging lantern above the platform 
dimly illumined those who passed in and out beneath it. 
Also there were lanterns flitting about everywhere, like fire- 
flies. 


MONTGOMERY’S 


233 

Mingling among the crowd, we found that a number were 
Lount’s men from Holland Landing, who had just arrived, 
very footsore and weary, and ready for supper, which, it 
appeared, they could not have, since sufficient supplies had 
not been laid in at the tavern. 

Some of them were for dealing rather roughly with the 
manager — Lingfoot, or Linfoot — who, they declared, had 
supplies hidden away and would not produce them, being 
fearful of not getting his pay; but others were inclined to 
give him the benefit of the doubt, and, after a little, quiet- 
ness was restored somewhat when the word went round that 
foragers had been sent to the neighboring farm houses. 

There was much dissatisfaction, too, that the arms that 
were to have been in quantity at the tavern did not seem to 
be there. The men who owned firelocks and fowling-pieces 
had brought them, and there were a few rifles, but many 
were furnished, so far, with nothing better than the pikes 
and cudgels which they had hoped to discard; and one of 
them, who had two cudgels, offered me one of his, remark- 
ing that it didn’t look much but that he “guessed it could 
give a fellow a pretty good clout on the head.” 

I took it, but I felt myself a joke of a soldier as I looked 
down at the knobs and bumps of the thing, and wished I had 
my good old rifle from home. 

“Look like callithumpians, don’t we?” remarked another 
young fellow. 

So the chaff went round among the younger chaps, but 
among the whiskered older men, I noticed that the talk was 
on a serious order, and that many of them were much dis- 
couraged because of the news, which had just arrived, of 
the defeat of Brown’s “patriotes” in Lower Canada. 

All the while I kept sharp watch for Hank and The 
Schoolmaster and the boys from home, but they did not 
come. 

I was anxious, too, to catch a glimpse of Lount and 
Mackenzie, and a big, burly fellow pointed out Lount to 
me. Following his finger I saw a huge man, with a fine head 
and face — his countenance now very anxious and serious. 


234 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“That’s him,” said the fellow. “He’s the best man in 
Upper Canady, an’ ’tis me that knows it. He gimme my 
ax, when I hadn’t tuppence to rub together, an’ that gimme 
my start. I’ve a goodish little farm now, though it’s five 
mile from anywheres because o’ the land hold-ups. The 
wife an’ childer’s gone to her father’s while I’m away. 
Yes, he gimme my start, and I’ve paid him fer the ax long 
ago.” 

“He let me have mine, too,” said another, addressing me. 
“You’re a city bug, judgin’ by the clothes of ye, so ye don’t 
know what an ax means to a man in the bush. He’s let 
hundreds go out like that, even to the Indians, but I don’t 
know as a man ever cheated ’im out of a cent, or fergot to 
pay ’im back jist as soon as he could git the money. He’s 
a grand man, is Lount, an’ us fellows ’ud folly ’im into the 
sea.” 

Of Mackenzie, until nearly ten o’clock, I saw not a 
glimpse, although it was said that he was now shut up in a 
room with some others, but had been about before and 
had given Lingfoot “down the banks” for not having sup- 
plies on hand. 

At about ten of the clock, however, he came down the 
stairs and pushed through the crowd to the stable yard, 
where he and three others mounted horseback and set off 
towards the City — no one about knowing just whence or 
why. One of the party, it was said, was Captain Anthony 
Anderson, who was to be one of the commanding officers 
in the advance which, it was believed, would be made next 
morning at daybreak. 

There was much talk as to whether the City would “show 
fight” or not, and even yet many believed that, because of 
the absence of the soldiers, the Government would throw 
up its hands at once. Some there were, however, who were 
equally sure that blood would be spilled, — and before many 
minutes their expectations were fulfilled. 

It could not have been more than a quarter past ten when, 
having gone out among the crowd in the backyard, I heard 
the galloping of horses’ feet and a rumbling as of great 


MONTGOMERY’S 


235 

excitement in front of the tavern. With many others I 
began to run to see what was the matter, but scarcely had 
we got around the corner of the building when the sharp 
crack of a rifle sounded, and, reaching the roadway, we saw 
a riderless horse galloping off full speed up the road, and 
some men lifting up its prostrate rider from the ground. 

“It’s Colonel Moodie l” some were exclaiming, — and 
others, “He was trying to break through to carry the news !” 

The greatest consternation, however, seemed to be due 
to the fact that one of the unfortunate man’s companions — 
there had been three of them — had escaped, and was off 
towards the City. 

“Never mind,” said some, “Mackenzie’s crowd’ll get him 
all right!” 

Colonel Moodie, meantime, was carried into the tavern. 
An old soldier in Europe, he had escaped all the dangers of 
the Peninsular War only to meet his death at a country 
wayside inn in this wild new world. Truly how strange are 
the ways of our lives ! 

Sick at heart — for there was blood on the frozen mud of 
the road — I went back again to the sheds, and was standing 
there, looking up at the clear, bright stars, and wondering 
why everyone could not be kind and fair, so that there would 
be no need of killings and wars, when there was sound of a 
galloping horse again, and evidence of a new excitement. 

Going back I found the men almost in a panic over the 
news that Captain Anderson — who had left but a few mo- 
ments before, and whom most of the men seemed to regard 
as our military head until Van Egmond arrived — had also 
been shot, and was lying dead up the road a piece. 

There were many inquiries for Mackenzie, but no one 
knew where he was, or whether he, too, had not met with 
mishap. 

Indeed, little that was definite could be learned by any of 
us who were there waiting for orders. We only knew 
that a “rebel” and a loyalist had both bitten the dust, and 
that we must wait for the next move. 

Deep gloom settled upon us ; talk died away, except for 


236 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

the arrival of a small party or two, who lunged in out of the 
darkness with some more fowling-pieces and cudgels, when 
suddenly over the top of Gallows Hill came the ringing of 
bells. 

‘‘The bells !” I exclaimed to Clinkenbocker, and then we 
saw that others were standing motionless as we, listening, 
while the clangor grew apace, one bell after another, ap- 
parently taking up the cry, and pealing out their alarm on 
the clear, frosty air. 

I strained my ears to distinguish the musical booming 
of the bell of St. James, and wondered what now my uncle 
thought of me. “I can never go back there again,” I re- 
flected, rather mournfully. 

... So the night was spent, small parties continuing to 
arrive almost every hour until we were in all about five hun- 
dred in number, many so weary from long marching that 
they threw themselves down on the floors and anywhere 
that a resting-place was afforded and were soon sound 
asleep. 

At about four o’clock I also was overcome with drowsi- 
ness — for, usually, when tired, I sleep hugely — and so I lay 
down at the back of one of the sheds, wrapped in horse 
blankets, and was soon snoring as soundly as any of them. 


CHAPTER XXVI 


THE SKIRMISH 

I T seemed that I was at home, and father was calling, 
“Ho there, Alan ! Time to get up !” . . . Presently the 
voice seemed not to be father’s. It was Hank’s, down by 
the swimming pool, and it was saying “Alan, wake up, old 
boy! What are you doing here ? Wake up!” . . . Then my 
feet seemed to be cold. 

The voice came again, accompanied by a shake of my 
shoulders and the flashing of light in my eyes — “Hello, 
Alan! Hello, I say! You’ll freeze out here!” 

I opened my eyes wide, and sure enough there was old 
Hank, in greatcoat and fur cap, bending over me and hold- 
ing a lantern. 

Straightway I jumped to my feet, forgetful of the numb- 
ness of them, and we almost hugged each other. 

After that it came to me where we were. It was not 
yet daylight, but crowds of men were walking about the 
building and in and out of the open back door, through 
which came the glimmer of candle-light. 

“Come on in,” urged Hank. “You must be nearly frozen. 
What did you lie down there for?” 

“Hold on a minute,” I said, stamping my feet to restore 
the circulation; “when did you come?” 

“Some half an hour ago. The rest of the fellows are 
here, — The Schoolmaster, too.” 

“And how in the world did you find me so soon?” I 
asked. 

“Oh, I knew you’d be here somewhere,” replied he, “so 
when I couldn’t find you in the house I got a lantern and 
prowled around the stables. Of course the last place I 
thought of was here. — Of all the fool places to lie down for 

237 


23 8 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

a sleep! — Are you sure you aren’t frozen anywhere ?” 

“Oh, no,” I said, “the blankets looked out for that. I 
hooked them out of the stable. I’d better put them back.” 

After we had put them in place, we went to find The 
Schoolmaster and the boys. The Master was in the hall- 
way, very much awake, and very busy getting hold of 
things by asking information of everyone in sight, but 
most of the rest were looking for somewhere to catch a 
nap. 

Jimmy Scott and Red Jock we found sitting on a bench 
in a corner of the kitchen, Jimmy less smiling than usual 
and quite lost as he looked about at the unaccustomed scene, 
while Jock, who appeared to be sizing up the situation in 
general, looked rather “dour.” His countenance lighted up, 
however, when we appeared, with the old home look that 
was good to see. 

Jimmy sprang to his feet at once and slapped me on the 
back for half a minute. Yes, Hannah was fine. She was 
over at his aunt’s, and the oxen, cow, calf, pig, chickens and 
ducks likewise. They had had a “divil” of a time getting 
the things all out. 

Jock did not get up at all but he gave me a grip that 
almost cracked my fingers. 

“Ah’ve been speirin’ for ye,” he said, “ben the hoose an’ 
but, an’ wis juist arrivin’ at the conclusion ye’re no verra 
wee! kent hereaboots. . . . It’s fine, mon, tae get a glint o’ 
ye again!” 

There was a little more talk, and I told him about Eliza- 
beth; then, suddenly recollecting, Hank exclaimed: 

“Where did you put Alan’s rifle, Jock?” 

“Dinna’ leap oot o’ yer skin ; it’s safe eneugh,” said Jock, 
and, stooping, he pulled it out from beneath the bench — 
my own rifle from home! — The dear lads had carried it in 
turn, along with their own arms, all that long weary march. 

“Ah doot ye’re juist lovin’ it,” said Jock, as I rubbed my 
fingers over the smooth stock and glistening barrel; “an’ 
weel ye may. It’s the best bit o’ airn in oor pairts — trim an’ 
slick as a filly!” 


239 


THE SKIRMISH 

— But I must hurry on. 

As morning broke, gray and cheerless, everyone about 
the place was astir, and men came out from every conceiv- 
able corner, unwashed and with hair disheveled, eager to 
know if there was to be any breakfast and if anything new 
had happened. But there was very little liveliness or goo'd 
cheer. Indeed a spirit of deep gloom seemed to have set- 
tled upon the place, partly because of Colonel Moodie’s 
dead body, still in the building, and partly because Colonel 
Van Egmond and his men from the West had not arrived, 
which was quite to be expected since it was not likely that 
he had received word of the change of the day. 

During the forenoon there was a little drilling, overmuch 
confusion, on the whole, and very little definiteness about 
anything. 

Over and over Hank and I wondered how things were 
going in the city, when we received rather unexpected in- 
formation. 

At about ten of the clock we stumbled upon a small boy 
loitering in a fence-corner, staring at the crowd with all 
his might. He looked as though he might be a young gaffer 
from the city, and his eyes were very wide and his face keen 
as a ferret’s. 

“Hello, Bub ! Where did you come from ?” I said. 

“Toronto,” he answered, jerking a thumb back over his 
shoulder, and continuing to stare at the men. 

“But how did you manage to get here ?” I asked. “Didn’t 
you run into a picket or anything?” 

“Oh, I just ducked around by the rail fences,” he ex- 
plained, betraying small knowledge of military terms. “I 
wanted to see what was goin’ on here.” 

“And what’s going on in the city?” we both asked, in a 
breath. 

“Why, all the stores is closed,” he said, interested in us 
now, “an’ they’re barricadin’ the Bank an’ ever so many 
places with planks, an’ they’re givin’ out guns — hundreds 
of them — at the City Hall.” 


2 4 o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“Whew!” whistled Hank; “this worth while.” 

“You bet !” I said. “For seeing things take a young gaffer 
like this every time. Let’s hunt up The Master. — Come on, 
Bub.” 

With a hand of each of us on the lad’s shoulder, lest he 
should bolt, which, apparently, he had no intention of doing, 
we pushed our way through until we found The School- 
master, who took the questioning in hand. 

The young gaffer was anxious to tell all he knew, and 
was becoming much filled with a sense of his importance. 

“There’s, awful crowds of men cornin’ in today from the 
lake way,” he said, — “from Hamilton, an’ oh, ever so many 
places. — An’ the Heads an’ Robinson’s women folks has all 
been put on the Transit, foot o’ Yonge Street, so they kin be 
steamed off if the city’s took.” 

And then he spied someone. “There’s my Uncle Jerry!” 
he exclaimed, and, that time, bolted, nor did we see an- 
other sight of him. 

“The trouble is,” remarked The Schoolmaster, “that one 
hardly knows just how far to believe a lad like that.” — 
Whether The Schoolmaster ever communicated what we 
had heard to the leaders or not, I have not since heard, but 
I have no doubt that he did. 

About an hour later we were all drawn up in front of 
the tavern, somewhat over seven hundred in all, perhaps, 
with the riflemen ahead, the pikemen next and the cudgel 
brigade in the rear — where I should have been had it not 
been for my sudden promotion by reason of my rifle — and 
there Mackenzie, sitting on a little white horse, with his 
overcoat buttoned up to his chin, talked to us for a while. 
We understood that our army was to be divided in two, one 
division to go down Yonge Street, with Lount as its leader, 
while the other was to branch off and go down the College 
Avenue with Mackenzie. 

. After a time we actually set off, Hank and I finding our- 
selves trudging along a few lines back in Lount’s division. 

At Gallows Hill we were halted, but before the word 
came to advance again a most unexpected event happened. 


THE SKIRMISH 


241 


Riding at a gallop from the city came three men, bearing 
a flag of truce. One of them, it was quickly noised about, 
was none other than Dr. Rolph, the others being Mister 
Baldwin and a Mister Carmichael; and, indeed, we were no 
little surprised to see those two good Reformers there with 
a flag of truce, nor, though we saw them talking at a little 
distance with our leaders, could we form any idea of what 
was in the wind. 

After a short time they rode back again with their flag, 
and we got the order to go forward towards the toll-gate, 
where again we were halted, with Mackenzie’s men to the 
right of us, wondering much what we should be expected 
to do. 

By this time the men seemed to have become greatly dis- 
satisfied, and to have lost confidence in Mackenzie, who 
seemed overwrought with excitement. Indeed the word 
went round that he was “off his head,” for which, I suspect, 
Red Jock was responsible, for earlier in the day, more than 
once, I heard him express the opinion that “Wee Mac” was 
“aff his heid.” 

Not far from the toll-gate, it being now past noon, some 
bread and stuff was served out to us, not very plentifully, 
and while we were eating it Mackenzie and a few others 
went in about Dr. Horne’s house, which was near by. Be- 
fore we had finished eating they came out again, and in a 
few minutes flame and smoke began to burst from the 
windows. We watched until the place was quite burned 
down, and some of the men said that Mackenzie himself 
had set it afire, but of that I do not know, as many reports 
flew around that were not true. 

Afterwards there was an attempt made to get us to 
march on into the city, but so many objections were made 
that finally we were told to go back to the tavern, which 
we did in any order that pleased us. 

On the way Hank and I caught up with The School- 
master and Clinkenbocker. 

The Schoolmaster was very much annoyed. It was poor 
soldiering, this, he said. The date should not have been 


242 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

changed. No advance should be attempted until Van Eg- 
mond arrived, and so forth. But the Sea Lion said not a 
word. 

Coming on towards evening, our leaders talked to us 
again, and requested us to follow them once more to the 
city. Preparations, they said, were going on there so fast 
that if we did not strike at once it might be useless to 
strike at all. 

So we all set off again, with our guns and pikes, and 
wearing our white badges, and by six o’clock had arrived 
again at the toll-gate. 

The next event was so comical that even yet I cannot 
write about it without laughing. I have heard of comedy. 
This performance, of which I will now tell, was, I think, the 
comedy act in our tragic little show at Montgomery’s. 

Finally, as we stood there at the toll-gate, with the stars 
beginning to come out above, the word was given for our 
party to advance, and off we started, with Lount leading 
us, — all fairly well excited, if my own feelings were any 
index to those of the rest. 

We proceeded along well enough until we had reached 
a point not far from the Green Bush tavern, where, at 
Jonathan Scott’s house, there is a high fence. 

At this place, all unknown to us, Sheriff Jarvis was sta- 
tioned with a small body of men, and as we advanced, all 
of a sudden, from behind the fence, they fired on us. 

The first row of our men, in which was The Schoolmaster, 
discharged their rifles and then threw themselves down so 
that those behind might fire unimpeded. But instead of 
that our men, some of whom thought that all who had 
dropped down were shot, were seized with a panic, and 
the most of them took to their heels and fled back up 
lYonge Street as fast as they could go. For a few minutes 
some of us stood our ground, when we saw that the loyalists 
were also running down Yonge Street, in the opposite direc- 
tion, as fast as they could go. 


THE SKIRMISH 


243 


It was the look of Hank that set me laughing. 

In the darkness I could see him standing there, with his 
hat off, looking first up and then down the street. 

“Good Lord!” he said; “are they running both ways?” 

By that time very few were left, but Lount and one or 
two more who were slowly following also. So we trudged 
back again — provoked, dissatisfied, yet amused. Someone 
said on the way that one of our men was lying back on 
the road dead. A few more were tying up wounds. And 
then Hank took off his cap and made me feel the inside 
of it. 

“That was a pretty close call, ,, he said, coolly. 

— And sure enough, there in the lining, front and back, 
was the hole left by a bullet. 

During that night many of the men deserted, some being 
now convinced that the undertaking was hopeless, while 
others, having found that more than a mere “demonstra- 
tion” was intended, refused to have anything further to 
do with the affair, declaring that such business as was 
now afoot was nothing short of treason. The majority, 
however, remembered their grievances and grimly deter- 
mined to “see the thing through” to the end, whatever that 
might be. If they went home at this juncture, they rea- 
soned, they would only be arrested anyhow. 

Apparently it had now been determined that we should 
wait for Colonel Van Egmond and his men, for all that day 
was spent rather idly, with intermittent drillings, the one 
event of importance being that Mackenzie rode out with a 
small party and intercepted the mails from the West, bring- 
ing the mail-bags back to the tavern. 

It was wonderful, however, how news managed to filter 
through to us from the city ; for during the day reports con- 
tinued to come in, in one way or another, confirming all the 
boy had said, and adding many things of greater import. 
By evening had come to us : that Sir Francis had fortified 
the Parliament Buildings; that loyalists were arriving in 
great numbers, including the men from Gore with Colonel 
Allan MacNab as their leader; that Colonel FitzGibbon had 


244 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

been appointed Commander of all the loyalist forces; and 
finally that Dr. Morrison had been arrested for high treason 
and that Dr. Rolph had fled to parts unknown; — all of 
which did not tend to raise our spirits. 

That night, very down-hearted but determined to see 
the affair out to its finish, we lay down early, wherever we 
could find a spot, to try to snatch some sleep so that we 
should be ready for the “battle 0 which, we felt, was pretty 
sure to come next day. 

Hank and I had chosen to bivouac in a corner of a loft 
above the stable, which was open to the stars on one side, 
but somewhat secluded, although a hard enough resting- 
place, for all the hay had been fed to the horses. 

“Wonder where The Schoolmaster is,” I remarked, as we 
lay there. 

“I saw him and Jock starting for a farmhouse a little 
while ago,” said Hank. — “What do you think’ll happen to- 
morrow, Alan ?” 

“To tell the truth,” I answered, “I’m afraid we're going 
to get the worst of it.” 

“Well, if we do,” returned Hank, “we’ll have the satis- 
faction of knowing we failed in a good cause. I understand 
now, Alan, how soldiers face death as they do.” 

“And always,” I added, “they are sure their cause is 
the right one. Their leaders — political and otherwise — see 
to that.” — Perhaps the words savored of sarcasm; but my 
enthusiasm had passed; I was weary and discouraged, and 
beginning to wonder whether my father and the “Moder- 
ates” in general had not been wholly right in thinking con- 
stitutional means the only practical resort in such case as 
ours. 

“But in this case ” began Hank. 

“Oh, in this case,” I interrupted, “morally we have the 
weight of the balance on our side, of course.” 

“Weight? — Why they haven’t a leg to stand on!” ex- 
claimed Hank, mixing our metaphors woefully. 

“All right,” I responded. “Now go to sleep, you old 
doughhead.” 


THE SKIRMISH 


245 

“Thank heaven, it isn’t so cold,” said he, and then he 
rolled over in his blanket and was soon asleep. 

But I lay for a long time, gazing up at the stars, and 
raising my head from time to time, to look out at the men,, 
with their twinkling lanterns, who continued to move about 
the yard. Once or twice during the night, also, I heard — ■ 
and saw — the arrival of small parties of reinforcements, 
men from a distance, no doubt, weary and footsore, who 
had arrived to be in time for “Thursday.” 

Next morning — Thursday, the 7th of December — we 
were up bright and early. 

The day was clear and sunshiny, and, somehow, we were 
in better spirits, the more so when, at about eight of the 
clock, Colonel Van Egmond arrived, for now we felt that 
we should be under real military leadership. His very pres- 
ence seemed to make my blood bound, although I saw noth- 
ing of him for a time save, once, the top of his kindly gray 
head, for immediately he was closeted with the leaders. 

Very soon, however, the military tactician was apparent, 
for the Colonel’s first move was to send a party of sixty 
men, under Captain Peter Matthews, down the Don Valley, 
as a ruse to distract the attention of the city in that direc- 
tion while we should make our main drive. — There, it was 
learned afterwards, they set fire to the bridge and to a house 
or two. But the loyalists were by this time too well aware 
of our doings to be misled by any ruse. 

During the next hour or two the Colonel reviewed us, 
and at the first word the evidence of the practiced soldier 
was clear to see. But I am sure he was deeply disap- 
pointed, for by this time there could not have been more 
than five hundred men in all, and the reinforcements ex- 
pected that morning did not arrive. About two hundred of 
us were armed with rifles, a few with old fowling-pieces, 
while the rest had nothing better than the pikes and cudgels. 
I doubt not but that to him we seemed but a sorry rabble. 


2 46 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

He had just begun to tell us what we were to do in case 
of obstruction, when one of the scouts came running in 
with the word that a whole army, with a band, was coming 
out Yonge Street to attack us. 

For a few moments there was intense excitement among 
us, then we got a hold upon ourselves again, and waited 
grimly, in the bright sunshine, while Van Egmond and 
Mackenzie, mounting to horseback, rode away south to re- 
connoiter. 

In a few moments back they came, and placed those of 
us who had arms in the bit of woods about half a mile 
south of the tavern, while those with the pikes and cudgels 
were left at the tavern itself. A few riflemen, also, were 
stationed in the field to the east of the building. 

Hank and I found ourselves in the woods, and there we 
waited, watching, for although the trees were large they 
were so thinned out that we could see clearly. I may con- 
fess to my Journal that my heart was thumping, and, glanc- 
ing at Hank, I wondered if his was also, although he was 
kneeling by a stump very coolly trying the sight of his 
rifle. 

Looking about I saw The Schoolmaster and Red Jock and 
Jimmy all behind a clump of cedar close to the fence, the 
Master’s long lean face outlined against the darkness of 
the cedars, Jimmy chewing tobacco, while Red Jock leaned 
forward peering between the bushes. — They had kept to- 
gether pretty closely, those three, for the past two days. 

Then suddenly a thrill ran through us, for we heard the 
strains of a band, and the beating of drums. 

Like frozen statues we stood, holding our breath, while 
the music grew louder, and we could distinguish quite 
easily The British Grenadiers , lilting out gayly on the clear 
morning sunshine. 

A moment later from over the top of Gallows Hill hove in 
sight a dark body of men, marching in order, with flags 
gayly waving. 

Hurriedly we looked to our rifles. 


THE SKIRMISH 


247 

On they came, nearer and nearer, their steady tramp smit- 
ing on our ears, in a dull thud, thud, thud ! 

Then all about us arose low cries. 

“The cannon! The cannon !” 

Yes, there it was — cannon drawn by horses, — we could 
not distinguish how many. — Nor could we form any idea as 
to the number of men; but they seemed legion as they 
came, pouring steadily on and on towards us like a black 
torrent down the road, with the sharp rows of their bayo- 
nets pointing upwards like waves serrated by a storm. 

A few moments later, and we heard the sharp command 
“Halt!” followed by other indistinguishable orders, and then 
“Fire!” 

Simultaneously with that word came our own order to 
fire, and then I knew nothing save that shots were rattling 
in the trees and that I was handling my rifle as fast as I 
could. 

At the next instant there came a great crashing into the 
tree-trunks. — The cannon were pouring out their grape-shot 
and canister! 

It was serious — that much I knew, but I continued to load 
and fire. My mouth seemed dry. 

Glancing at Hank I saw him still kneeling behind his 
stump, working coolly as ever, but with flushed cheeks. 

Into the trees came broadside after broadside from the 
loyalists. . . . Then, somehow I knew that our men were 
flying at top speed — back and back from the roadway — 
some of them turning to fire parting shots as they ran ! 

“The cause” was lost ! Our little army of “patriots” was 
scattered to the winds ! 

It was now “Save himself who can!” and in a moment 
Hank and I were running side by side, farther into the 
woods, while the shots continued to rattle upon the tree- 
trunks, and great branches came crashing to the ground. 

Evidently our men were making for the deeper forest 
beyond, and there also we made way as speedily as we 
could, leaping over down-fallen logs and sharp little hol- 
lows. I saw some of the fugitives bleeding but no one fell. 


24B THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

• — Afterwards I learned that although many were wounded 
only one then met his death, and he was in the field near to 
the tavern. He was shot through the head. Later four 
of the wounded died in the hospital. 

“It’s run or pay for it now,” said Hank, when he could 
find his voice. ‘'If we’re caught we’ll be arrested.” 

“Yes,” said I, turning my head to look back at the road 
before we should plunge into the deeper woods. 

As far North upon it as I could see, were galloping 
horses. 

Then there came a puff of smoke from the tavern win- 
dows. 

“For heaven’s sake, look there, Hank !” I exclaimed. 

“Yes, they’ve fired it!” he said, and for just an instant 
we stood looking. All along the road the loyalist troops 
were scattered, men running and shouting, and horses gal- 
loping with the lash to them ; but some of the foot-soldiers 
were running towards us through the woods, so again we 
took to our heels. 

And now I can write no more at this time. 

The story is a long one, and, I fear, for some of our 
poor patriots is not yet ended. 

I will just add that since that dark day I have learned 
that the Lieutenant-Governor himself was with the troops, 
as were also Judge Jones and most of the prominent men 
of the city. The main body of the loyalists, perhaps seven 
hundred men, were led by Colonel MacNab, while there 
were also two wings, which came, for the most part, by 
the fields, the right officered by Colonel Jarvis and the left 
by Colonel Chisholm and Judge McLean. 

In the city, as the army left, there must have been great 
excitement, for they say the windows and porch-tops, and 
even the tops of the houses, wherever a footing could be 
gained, were crowded with people, who cheered and waved 
flags and handkerchiefs as the men marched by. 

But now — another day for the rest of the story. 


CHAPTER XXVII 


THE FUGITIVES 

W E must have been running fast northward, for the 
point at which we paused, when we looked back and 
saw the smoke bursting from the tavern windows, seemed 
far beyond. We were standing then upon an eminence, and 
there was a long rift in the woods between; but soon we 
plunged into deeper wildernesses, running through small 
ravines and springing over logs until we were obliged to 
slacken speed by reason of sheer weariness. 

Not a word did Hank and I say to each other — perhaps 
we had not the wind to spare — but I wondered if he was 
wondering, as was I, whether we should be arrested, and, 
if so, whether we should be shot as traitors. I well knew 
the point of view of the loyalists — it had been impressed 
upon me by my stay in Uncle Joe’s house — that such a pro- 
ceeding as we had entered upon spelled nothing short of 
treason, high treason at that, inexplicable as inexcusable. 
Nevertheless, with these fears heavy upon me because of 
our ghastly failure, another thought kept surging up and 
up through the others, like a glad, warm, bubbling spring 
of pure water, glittering radiant in the sun : I had not sat 
down between two stools . — My father might be right in his 
championship of constitutional means instead of this wild 
action into which we had hurled ourselves — and lost ; never- 
theless, let come what might now, I would remember that 
when the time came I had acted a man’s part, with decision 
and persistence. I had thrown myself with the side which, 
after all, called out, as it seemed to me at the time, with 
best reason, for justice. Often this thing had worried me 
— lest, in my zeal for seeing both sides, I might wobble. 

“I didn’t sit down between two stools ! I didn’t sit down 
249 


250 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

between two stools !” my soul kept singing as I ran on, pant- 
ing, among the trees and logs. 

Occasionally we caught sight of other fleeing figures, be- 
tween the gray maple and oak trunks, and occasionally, 
where rifts in the woods intervened, saw men running across 
the fields ; then, somehow, we must have circled towards the 
west, for presently we ran across a trail and I saw a land- 
mark that I knew, a curiously bent beech with three branches 
growing straight up, like three miniature trees, from the 
arched trunk. 

Past this, in the shelter of a clump of evergreens, I 
stopped. 

“See here, Hank/’ I said, “if we keep on like this we’ll 
get back plump to the city. We’re circling.” 

“How do you know ?” he asked. 

“I knew that tree back there.” 

“Of course,” he said, with his cap off and mopping the 
sweat from his forehead. “We forgot that one goes that 
way in the bush. I suppose we’ll have to sight trees, but 
it’s infernally slow. — We seem to have got away from the 
other fellows.” 

“There’s a river ahead there a bit,” I suggested. “We 
might follow it until we come to a railroad or something 
we are sure about.” 

“The very idea !” he agreed, enthusiastically. “Come on !” 
Then, suddenly he sat down. “Wait a minute,” he said. 
“Jove, I’m winded!” 

So I sat down, too, or rather, lay down, with my ear to 
the ground, listening for pursuing footsteps. 

“What are you going to do, Hank?” I asked, in a half 
whisper. 

“Why, make for The States, I guess,” he replied, in the 
same low tone. “There’s nothing else for it.” 

“Have you any money ?” 

“A little. Have you?” 

I nodded. “A little. I wish I had more.” 

“Never mind, we can work,” he said. “I hope the folks 
at home’ll not be too uneasy. But we can write as soon as 


THE FUGITIVES 


251 

we’re safe over the line. I wish the mails went better/* 

I nodded again, but — perhaps it was the sight of the 
trail to the city that had started them, or perhaps it was 
merely the breathing-space — a host of questions and recol- 
lections were beginning to surge into my mind, and I was 
becoming much troubled. I was remembering certain items 
about my uncle’s business of which he should know and 
which only I could tell him satisfactorily; I had not had 
time to put the books, and so on, in ship-shape. There were 
certain things of my own at the house, too, which I wanted 
(including, I may here confess, some little keepsakes of 
Barry), but most of all my journal, which, to my excited 
imagination, contained things that might, if discovered, be 
embarrassing to the family. It began to appear to me that, 
come what might, I must go back, — and yet how could I de- 
sert Hank ? 

“Come,” he said, presently, “this will never do ! They’ll 
catch us here,” and, indeed, even as he spoke, there came 
the faint thud of horses’ feet approaching on the trail some 
distance away. 

As lightly and quietly as we could we made off again, and 
this time we took pains to sight the trees ahead, keeping on 
in as straight a line as possible towards the river. 

Just before we reached it we heard the sound of other 
hurrying footsteps, and, at some little distance, saw forms 
moving among the trees, evidently heading for the same 
point as ourselves. Fearing pursuers, we froze motionless 
behind a thick balsam and focused our vision on the rapidly 
moving figures. 

“Hooray!” whispered Hank, in a moment. “It’s Jimmy 
Scott and Dick!” — And then and there he restrained a wild 
desire to halloo to them, finding expression, an instant later, 
in frantic wavings, when Jimmy’s red face, surmounted by 
its coonskin cap, turned towards us, almost simultaneously 
disappearing as his body dropped beneath the undergrowth. 

In another second, evidently upon recognition of us, the 
coonskin cap and red face reappeared again, and Hank re- 
newed his wavings. 


252 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

A short run brought us up, and Jimmy’s relieved counte- 
nance relaxed into his iamiliar grin. 

“I thought yis was some o’ them damn loyalists,” said 
he, in a stage whisper, while Dick suddenly reappeared 
from behind a huge log. 

“Where are you going?” asked Hank. 

“Why, back to Hannah, o’ course,” said Jimmy, quite 
positively. 

“But you can’t do that,” said Hank. “The settlement’ll be 
raked through and through, and every man- jack of us’ll 
be arrested.” 

“That’s what I’ve been tellin' him,” broke in Dick, ex- 
citedly. “It’s the States fer us — er the jail. I’m not goin’ 
to jail. I’ll shoot myself first.” 

“Well, let’s git out o’ this,” said Jimmy, voicing the 
thought of all of us. “The air’s not healthy here. There’s 
the river. Golly, I wish we had your canoe, Hank !” 

Again they would have made on, but I stopped them. 

“Well, see here, fellows.” I said, “I’ll say good-by here. 
I’ve got to go back.” 

“Back where ?” they demanded, in a breath. 

“Back to the city.” 

“The divil ye are!” exclaimed Jimmy, while the other 
two gazed at me open-mouthed. 

“I have to ; I must,” I explained, diving into my pockets 
in search of my wallet. “There are things I must see to.” 

Hank caught me by the arm. 

“Alan, are you clean crazy?” he said. “Why you' fool 
boy, you might as well walk into a den of lions ! Don’t you 


“Yes, I see everything,” I interrupted. “And I’m going 
back. I tell you I must. There’s no time to argue or to ex- 
plain. — Here, take this, Hank,” as I crammed the wallet into 
his hand. “You may need it. Now, off with you! Don’t 
worry about me. I’ll be all right.” 

“But” — they began to expostulate. 

“Go on,” I said, “I’m not going with you.— Go on! You’ll 


THE FUGITIVES 


253 

be caught here, and it’ll be all the worse for the whole of 
us.” 

For an instant they stared at me, then Hank looked into 
my eyes, and down at the wallet, and into my eyes again, 
with tears coming into his own. 

“Thanks, Alan,” he said, gulping hard, and then trying 
to smile, took the wallet — all too little it contained — and 
put it in his pocket. 

I held out my hand to Jimmy and he squeezed it until the 
bones cracked. Then I shook hands with Dick, but he 
would not look at me, only off into the woods. I knew he 
could not. As he trudged off after Jimmy, Hank waited for 
an instant. 

“I’ll go with you, Alan,” he said, but I would have none 
of that. 

“No,” I insisted, “that would only make things worse 
for both of us.” 

We looked into each other’s faces for just one instant, 
then — we kissed. We had never done that before. 

There I stood, watching, while Hank, head down, fol- 
lowed the other two, then, when he had waved to me for the 
last time and the last sight of them had been blotted out, 
I turned back and for a little walked on aimlessly, un- 
consciously following the river. That route, I knew, would 
bring me eventually to the King’s Mills, but walking would 
be easier along the trail, and so I took my way back to it. 

Just before reaching it, however, — very fortunately, as 
it soon proved — I stepped into a hole and twisted my ankle. 

It was very painful, and for a little I had to sit down, 
and take off my boot and rub it, it swelling so quickly that 
when I tried to put on the boot again the laces had to be left 
loose and I could only walk by limping. 

Having proceeded thus for a few paces along the trail, 
I heard horses approaching towards me. 

I will admit that my heart “jumped into my mouth” for 
a moment, but “Keep up a bold front,” said I to myself, and 
so I limped on with apparent assurance. 

The arrivals proved to be three horsemen, armed, fol- 


256 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

have you been ? And what a fright you look ! I don’t won- 
der Kate ran away. Go to your room at once, and I’ll send 
you some hot water.” 

Without a word I began to mount the stairs, but be- 
fore I had taken the second step she was at my side, help- 
ing me. 

“You’ve been wounded?” she said. “You poor dear boy ! 
Is it your foot? Oh, dear, I wonder where Daddy is.” 

“It’s only a bit of a sprain,” I explained. “Nothing 
at all.” 

But it was not until I reached my room and caught a 
glimpse of myself in the mirror that I realized how wild 
and ruffianly I looked, for my clothes were torn, and my 
boots scratched and red, and my face dirty with beard, 
for I had not shaven since leaving the city. 

“Sit down there,” commanded my cousin, “and don’t 
budge an inch until I get a bandage. You’ll see what 
Daddy’s daughter can do.” 

And so she left me very comfortable in the soft armchair, 
coming back presently with warm water and bathing and 
bandaging my ankle so tenderly that I could have kissed 
her, but only laid my hand on her glossy head and told 
her how dear she was. 

Then she went out, but by the time I was presentable she 
was at the door again, and beckoned me to the little den 
at the end of the hall where she had spread a small table 
for me. 

“We haven’t told mother yet that you are here,” she 
said. “She is in such a state of nervousness, with the fright 
of it all, and she thinks the rebels are all dyed-in-the-wool 
villains. You really are a rebel, aren’t you, Alan? I won- 
der you had the face to come back into the city.” 

She was not scolding, this charming cousin of mine — 
merely stating facts in a matter-of-fact way, and as I ate, 
she perched herself on the foot of a couch, watching me. 

“By Jove, you’re a jewel, Nora!” I said, as I fell upon 
the hot meat pasty which, with bread and butter, hot tea 
and jam, made a meal which, for deliciousness, seemed 


THE FUGITIVES 


257 

one for the gods rather than for a discredited rebel. “I’m 
ravenous. But tell me, am I debarred from the dining- 
room?” 

“I don’t know,” she said, “but don’t worry your head 
about that now. .Eat your supper — and then, tell me all 
about it.” 

She was watching me in frank expectancy, and I told 
her the whole story, every word of it. 

“I don’t know what Daddy will say about it,” she said 
at last. “I’ll warrant wherever he is down town now he’s 
cursing the rebels, every man of them. He’s very much 
excited, and yet — I think he has been uneasy about you, 
Alan. Just now the best thing you can do will be to go 
to bed and get a good rest. I’ll not say anything to 
Daddy tonight about your being back.” 

And then she told me the story of all that had happened 
since I left; of the consternation that reigned in the house 
when it was known that I had disappeared; of the prepara- 
tions in the city; of the great excitement when it was 
known that the rebels were actually on their way in; and 
of the wild cheering that went up — while the women wept 
for anxiety — as the loyalist forces with their two cannon set 
off on their way up Yonge Street towards Gallows Hill. 

“What did Uncle Joe say when I did not come back?” I 
asked, at the first opportunity. 

She laughed a little. 

“Why,” she said, “he ramped and tore about a bit, and 
declared he’d always known you were a mischief-maker and 
a fraud, and then at the next breath he ‘hoped to the Lord* 
nothing would happen you.” 

“I don’t suppose he’ll be very glad to see me back here,” 
I remarked, rather ruefully, “but there were some things in 
connection with the business that I simply had to go over 
with him.” 

“Oh,” she said, smiling again, “as soon as he knows you’re 
safe and sound he’ll likely condemn you to all the depths, 
but don’t let that worry you. Now then,” and she held up 
a reproachful finger at me, “it’s scandalously late. Fo£ 


258 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

shame ! Off to bed with you, and don’t get up until I call 
you.” 

With that she flitted over to me like a butterfly and planted 
a kiss fair on my forehead, fluttering off again before I 
could collect my wits. But as she opened the door, there 
stood Kate, very beautiful in some sort of a blue dressing- 
gown. 

“I’m sorry I was so rude, Alan,” she said. “But you 
frightened me so. I wanted to come long ago, but mother 
couldn’t sleep and I’ve been sitting with her. We thought it 
might be better not to — to disturb her tonight.” 

“Not to disturb me tonight!” come my Aunt’s voice from 
the hall. “Not to tell me our boy was here!” — And then 
there was Aunt Octavia herself, laughing and crying, and 
hugging me and scolding the girls all in a breath. “Why, 
you foolish children, didn’t you know most of my worry 
jvas for fear he might be hurt?” 

It was quite two of the clock before we went to bed, 
and still Uncle Joe had not come in. 

He was standing before the grate when I went down to 
breakfast next morning. They had not told him, and when 
I went in he stared at me for a moment as though he were 
seeing an apparition. Then he was across the floor at a 
bound, shaking me and punching me, and telling me how 
glad he was to see me back, although I “well deserved to 
have a bullet through my gizzard.” 

All through breakfast he beamed and joked, and tried to 
make me eat enough for three lumber-jacks. It was while 
we smoked together afterwards that his choler rose, and 
that all of my own fault, perhaps. 

I had made a clean breast of the whole story, as I had to 
Nora, he listening with intense interest. Then it seemed in- 
cumbent upon me to say something about my regret that the 
movement had failed, considering the justice of the cause. 

He grew red to the very top of his bald head. 

“What, sir! What!” he exclaimed, jumping to his feet 
and throwing his pipe on the hearth; “you’re still one of 

’em!” 

[ ■ 


THE FUGITIVES 


259 

With that I did not improve matters — I should have 
known better — by attempting to justify my positipn, for 
he went from bad to worse, ending by ordering me off 
the place. 

“One of that herd still!” he exclaimed, using plenty of 
adjectives by way of emphasis; “and you dared to come 
back to my house ! Gad, sir, do you take me for a low- 
down cur, sir, that’ll be spit upon and then let it be rubbed 
in? Out of my house, sir, bag and baggage! I’ll have you 
know I harbor no treason in my house, no, nor no traitor! 
Pack, sir ! Do you hear me? Pack, I say !” 

Which forthwith I did. 

While I was upstairs putting my things in my traveling- 
bags and wondering mightily whether I should find more 
difficulty in getting out of the city than I had in getting 
back into it, I could hear the voices of the women, down- 
stairs, evidently expostulating with my excited uncle, and 
his in return, angrily refusing compromise. Then they 
came up to me — my Aunt and the girls — and my Aunt 
cried a little and the girls hung about me. 

When at last we went down, I put the bags in the hall 
and went to him. He was standing at a window looking 
out, and he did not turn around. 

“I’m going down to the shop to put the books in shape, 
uncle,” I said; “I’ll write down everything else necessary 
and leave it sealed on the desk. Won’t you shake hands?” 

But he neither turned nor spoke. 

I kissed the rest of them and limped down the steps. 
“So that’s the end of another chapter,” I said to myself, 
sorrowfully enough. “I wonder what next?” 

But I do not think I had gone ten rods along the flags 
when I heard his voice calling, “Alan ! Alan !” 

I turned and went back. He had come down the steps 
and was waiting for me, a bit apologetically, I thought. 

“Go upstairs and take the things out of those fool bags, 
and take care of your foot, sir,” he said. Then when we had 
got into the hall: “Alan, lad, I’m a hot-headed old idiot. 
But you’ve got to put up with me, lad, — you’ve got to put 


26 o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


up with me.” And then we gripped hands and he followed 
me to my room. 

“Tear an’ ages, lad, didn’t you know I never meant you 
to go like that?” he said. “Why, lad, you’re the only son 
I’ve got.” 

“But I didn’t mean to stay, Uncle Joe,” I returned. “I 
— I can't stay. It might compromise you for me to be here. 
I just came back to finish the work at the books and to 
get some things.” 

He would not listen to that at all. I must just keep on 
where I was, he said. It was not necessary for us to tell all 
the world I had been at Montgomery’s. I was only a young 
fool anyhow, carried off my balance for a while. I would 
know better later, and be one of the Queen’s most loyal 
subjects, God bless her ! 

So here I am still, writing in my own little muslin- 
curtained room. 

There is a reward of £1,000 out for Mackenzie, and £500 
for Lount, Gibson, Jesse Lloyd and others. Matthews was 
taken, on the Saturday night after the fight, in a house in 
Markham township, and is now in jail, as is also good old 
Van Egmond, who could not keep up in the flight and was 
discovered in a farmhouse out north near the Golden Lion 
Inn. From about Bradford the other day, fifty prisoners 
were brought in, and paraded, fastened to a rope, down 
Yonge Street, amid the hoots and jeers of the crowds that 
gathered to look on. 

In the midst of all this I feel like a hypocrite. Yet — 
who knows ? — I may find it possible, eventually, to do more 
for our people here than were I to fly and probably be 
captured and brought back like the rest of them. In the 
meantime I shall lie low. 

But I fear we have fallen on evil times indeed, and that, 
as my father said, we have but put it into the hands of 
the Powers in this country to put on the screws tighter 
than ever. 

I wonder where Barry is this night. Glad am I that she 
was safely away from all this turmoil and danger. 


CHAPTER XXVIII 


AN INTERLUDE 

C OULD you sit over a bit, Alan Machree, until I put the 
dinner on ? It’s liking the old stone fire-place you are, 
I believe, as well as the fine grates in the city.” 

“And better, Mother of Mine,” as I drew aside for my 
little mother. “This old fireside has — peculiar associations, 

you see. Why, it calls up pictures of spankings, and ” 

but she playfully covered my mouth with her hand. 

“But it’s grand,” she said, sitting down in her rush rocker, 
and fanning her pink cheeks, all lighted up with the glow 
of the blazing logs, “it’s grand, laddie, that we’re all here 
together. It’s been a happy Christmas for us, after all the 
worry.” Then, with a shadow passing over her face, “It’s 
strange, Alan, that one can be happy when others are not; 
we’re selfish, I fear, over our own. But one’s heart does 
ache, too, at times. ... I wonder where they all are, this 
day.” 

“Yes, — I wonder,” said I. I knew she was thinking, most 
of all, of Hank, and The Schoolmaster, and Red Jock, 
and Jimmy Scott, and poor old Dickie Jones — such a lad 
he is, younger even than Hank. 

“It doesn’t seem fair, mother,” I added, “that I should be 
living on the cream of the land, when they are — wherever 
they are.” 

“Well, it would not help them — nor anything — if you 
were suffering, too,” she said. 

“Perhaps not. Yet sometimes I cannot help feeling like 
a churl. Sometimes I almost think it would have been a 
relief if I had been caught. Yet I can think of no benefit 
to be gained, now, for anyone, by giving myself up.” 

“No, no. You must not think of that.” 

261 


262 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

She stooped to rake out the fire better, then seated her- 
self in her low rocker again. 

“Surely everything must come out right in the end,” she 
went on. “The whole story must come out, and then, surely 
the sentences will be moderated. They’re excited yet — 
those men who are passing judgment.” 

I nodded, rather gloomily, but said nothing. Whatever 
be the end, I knew better than my mother, of the present 
sufferings of the refugees in their winter flight, and of those 
others, still more wretched, in the prisons. 

So we sat in silence for a little, while the potatoes bubbled 
over the ruddy coals, and the bacon in the pan began to 
sizzle, sending forth tempting odors. 

Presently my mother sprang up, as though to drive off 
unpleasant reverie. 

“It’s a charming day,” she said, drawing back the white 
knitted curtain. 

Through the window, as though it were a framed pic- 
ture, I could see the snowy sunlit fields, and, in the distance, 
the purplish-brown background of the Golden-Winged 
Woods. As she stood there, a little “snow-bird” came 
to the sill and began pecking. 

“He’s becoming quite tame,” said she. “He comes every 
day for his crumbs.” 

' For a few moments we watched him, then my mother 
fastened the curtains back. “Pity that such a view should be 
shut out,” she said. “After all, winter has its own beauty, 
fearsome as it sometimes seems in the bush.” 

“It’s very beautiful,” I said, but I fear there was not 
much life in the words, for as I looked at the trees be- 
yond I was thinking, not only of the refugees but also of 
Barry — Barry with her red sash and the little green vine in 
her hair, a glowing spirit of the green sun-washed woods 
of a happy May-time now long months past. I wondered, 
too, if it were right for me to think of her now; yet this 
day, looking out upon her old haunts, I could not put her 
away from me. Sometimes I had been able to do so, — but 
the effort had left me even physically weary. 


AN INTERLUDE 


263 

Perhaps my mother, in some dim fashion, divined my 
thought. — Strange it is how so often, and especially with 
those we love, thought seems to course from one to another, 
as though some mysterious invisible current were carrying 
it ! — At all events she came to me and began smoothing my 
hair back in the way that is so sweet to me. 

“Laddie Machree,” she said, “we did not speak of it yes- 
terday, when Father gave you the deed, but I want to tell 
you that, when we bought the place, we hoped Barry would 
share it with you.” 

She was speaking of Big Bill’s farm, up the south branch 
of the river, which they had bought and given me for a 
Christmas surprise, a little unexpected fortune that had 
come to my father having been expended in that way. 
Proud they had been to do that for me, and I could have 
wept for tenderness over the sweetness of their gift. But 
it had been hard for me to hide altogether that, since all 
my visions of having land of my own had centered about 
Barry, it had brought me as much pain as joy. 

I drew my mother very close to me, hoping her mother 
eyes were not too keen. 

“Of course,” I said. “But I love that farm. There’s 
not better land hereabouts. I think we’ll have to call it 
‘Riverdale,’ mother. — And, you know, it was all my fault, 

- — your not knowing about Barry, I mean. I — I think I was 
leaving that until I came home.” 

She smiled, but very tenderly. 

“You’re like your father in some things, Alan, — reticent. 
It’s a never-ending marvel to me how characteristics re- 
appear, sometimes in the children, sometimes in the grand- 
children, and how the traits of both parents or grand- 
parents — and perhaps further back than that — may enter 
into one little babe and grow up with him.” 

“Yes,” I replied, “Barry spoke of that one day. She 
said she was quite sure she herself was ‘two people.’ ” 

I was not sure at first that she heard me, for she looked 
lost in meditation. 

“It’s a great responsibility to be a parent, Alan,” she 


264 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

remarked, presently, and then my words, apparently, came 
back to her. 

“Barry was an unusual girl — a most unusual girl/’ she 
said. “Often I wonder about her, and how she came to be 
with the Deverils.” 

“I am glad,” I said, “that you learned to love her in spite 
of that. Do you remember the day you told me about 
picking up the white wake-robin from the mud ?” 

She smiled assent. “I called Barry ‘our wake-robin/ 
did I not?” 

“Yes. I loved you for that.” 

“Well,” she continued, “she is our wake-robin still, Alan. 
There is this about a perfect friendship, — that the memory 
of it is always white and sweet, like a lily. One would not 
have missed it. It lives forever.” 

Silently I took her hand and pressed it to my cheek. 

“I am not sure,” she went on again, still smoothing my 
hair, “that if we had known — about Barry, I mean — we 
might not have given you the money instead, to go to the 
Upper Canada College. But, dear, you can sell the place, 
if you like, you know.” 

“I don’t want to sell the place,” I said. “There’ll be 
another way for me to go to the College if I take that into 
my head, Mother. But perhaps I’ll not care to go now. 
I’m finding out that, with the books, and seeing enough of 
life, and having enough application, a man can get some- 
where even by himself. I’m a bit old now to think of 
starting to the College.” 

She kissed me on the forehead, and stepped away to set 
the table. Was it the strange, invisible current of under- 
standing between us that told me she was hoping that per- 
haps, after a while, someone else would come to fill my 
heart and help me to make a home on the farm by the river ? 

I watched her as she went to the cupboard and took 
down, in my honor, some of the treasured, blue-patterned 
dishes that had been her mother’s mother’s. How pretty 
she was, with the little ringlets escaping from beneath her 


AN INTERLUDE 265 

white cap! And how housewifely the way in which she 
handled the quaint old heirlooms ! 

“Do you think,” she asked presently, — and I could have 
smiled at the transparency of her, — “that Nora will be sure 
to visit us next summer?” 

“I think so,” I answered, “She says she ‘adores’ the 
bush, and she is an all-round good comrade, ready for 
anything.” 

— Indeed the idea must have remained with her all day, 
for at the dinner-hour she remarked to my father, quite 
casually, that Mary Lathrop, her dear girlhood friend, had 
married a cousin and was very happy. 

A little while ago I stopped writing because of a tap at 
the door. 

When my mother opened it there stood Hannah, who, 
since Jimmy went away to Montgomery’s, has been back 
with her aunt. 

“I heerd ye was home, Alan,” she said, “but I wus cornin’ 
over anyways. I wanted to tell yer mother the news — an’ 
yer father, too. He’ll be good an’ glad to hear it, knowin’ all 
that’s goin’ on.” 

“Why, what’s the news?” we asked, simultaneously. 

“I got a letter!” she said, triumphantly, sitting down 
by the fire and throwing back her shawl. “It came yister- 
day — Christmas, sure enough. Jimmy’s got to the States 
all right.” 

“And what about ” I began, eagerly. 

“Oh, Hank an’ Dick’s with him.” 

“Thank the Lord!” I exclaimed, and never had I ut- 
tered more fervently pious thanksgiving. 

“They had a divil of a time gittin’ there,” continued 
Llannah placidly. “Jimmy says it’s too long to write, but 
enyhow I’m to go too in 'the spring. They’re all workin’. 
Mebbe ye’ll like to see the letter.” 

Quite proudly she handed it to me. It was a marvel of 
spelling and composition, but Jimmy’s warm heart throbbed 
between the lines. Something in this wise was it ; 


264 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

remarked, presently, and then my words, apparently, came 
back to her. 

“Barry was an unusual girl — a most unusual girl,” she 
said. “Often I wonder about her, and how she came to be 
with the Deverils.” 

“I am glad,” I said, “that you learned to love her in spite 
of that. Do you remember the day you told me about 
picking up the white wake-robin from the mud ?” 

She smiled assent. “I called Barry 'our wake-robin/ 
did I not?” 

“Yes. I loved you for that.” 

“Well,” she continued, “she is our wake-robin still, Alan. 
There is this about a perfect friendship, — that the memory 
of it is always white and sweet, like a lily. One would not 
have missed it. It lives forever.” 

Silently I took her hand and pressed it to my cheek. 

“I am not sure,” she went on again, still smoothing my 
hair, “that if we had known — about Barry, I mean — we 
might not have given you the money instead, to go to the 
Upper Canada College. But, dear, you can sell the place, 
if you like, you know.” 

“I don’t want to sell the place,” I said. “There’ll be 
another way for me to go to the College if I take that into 
my head, Mother. But perhaps I’ll not care to go now. 
I’m finding out that, with the books, and seeing enough of 
life, and having enough application, a man can get some- 
where even by himself. I’m a bit old now to think of 
starting to the College.” 

She kissed me on the forehead, and stepped away to set 
the table. Was it the strange, invisible current of under- 
standing between us that told me she was hoping that per- 
haps, after a while, someone else would come to fill my 
heart and help me to make a home on the farm by the river ? 

I watched her as she went to the cupboard and took 
down, in my honor, some of the treasured, blue-patterned 
dishes that had been her mother’s mother’s. How pretty 
she was, with the little ringlets escaping from beneath her 


AN INTERLUDE 265 

white cap ! And how housewifely the way in which she 
handled the quaint old heirlooms ! 

“Do you think,” she asked presently, — and I could have 
smiled at the transparency of her, — “that Nora will be sure 
to visit us next summer?” 

“I think so,” I answered, “She says she 'adores’ the 
bush, and she is an all-round good comrade, ready for 
anything.” 

— Indeed the idea must have remained with her all day, 
for at the dinner-hour she remarked to my father, quite 
casually, that Mary Lathrop, her dear girlhood friend, had 
married a cousin and was very happy. 

A little while ago I stopped writing because of a tap at 
the door. 

When my mother opened it there stood Hannah, who, 
since Jimmy went away to Montgomery’s, has been back 
with her aunt. 

“I heerd ye was home, Alan,” she said, “but I wus cornin’ 
over anyways. I wanted to tell yer mother the news — an’ 
yer father, too. He’ll be good an’ glad to hear it, knowin’ all 
that’s goin’ on.” 

“Why, what’s the news ?” we asked, simultaneously. 

“I got a letter!” she said, triumphantly, sitting down 
by the fire and throwing back her shawl. “It came yister- 
day — Christmas, sure enough. Jimmy’s got to the States 
all right.” 

“And what about ” I began, eagerly. 

“Oh, Hank an’ Dick’s with him.” 

“Thank the Lord!” I exclaimed, and never had I ut- 
tered more fervently pious thanksgiving. 

“They had a divil of a time gittin’ there,” continued 
Hannah placidly. “Jimmy says it’s too long to write, but 
enyhow I’m to go too in the spring. They’re all workin’. 
Mebbe ye’ll like to see the letter.” 

Quite proudly she handed it to me. It was a marvel of 
spelling and composition, but Jimmy’s warm heart throbbed 
between the lines. Something in this wise was it ; 


266 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


“Dere Hannah 

i now take my pen in hand to rite you hopping this will 
find you well as it leves me at present we had a divvle of 
a time gitin hear but were hear all rite you bet ile tell you all 
about it wen i see you its to long to rite we nere starved an 
hid in haystaks an slep wonn nite over a pig stye an got over 
in a bote in the middel of a storm me an dick rowed an hank 
steared the bote we stole the bote but hopped it ud drift 
back so the man wudnt loose it hanks a dam fine felow sos 
dick were all workin now dick an me piling frate an hanks 
in a stoar hes ritin to nite we jist started work hear to 
days ago we see lots of rebbles from hoam, that is Canada 
but none from the korners were loansome you bet but i gess 
weve got to git over that as sune as it gits fit to travell in 
spring Hannah ile send you monie to come hear i kin hardly 
wate mebbe youd better sell the cow an pig an oxen but if 
you cud kepe a fue of the hens we cud kep them hear 
an it ud be more like hoam. give my love to everybodie an 
be shure to kepe pleanty of it fer yerself Hannah you kin 
rite me to rochester an plese rite sune im as loansome as 
the divvle 

yure lovin husband 

Jas. R. Scott. 

“So they’re in Rochester, Hannah,” I said, as I handed 
her back the letter. “Well that’s the best news I’ve heard 
in a long time. I’ll write to them all right away, too.” 

“They’ll be jist bustin’ to hear from ye,” returned Han- 
nah. “Now finish yer writin’ an’ I’ll help yer mother with 
the evenin’ work. I’m quite to home here now.” 

So she bustled about, while I finished my “writin’.” 

Tomorrow, weather and roads permitting, I start back 
for the City. It has been a precious holiday. Yet, some- 
how, I have felt so old, through it all. Never, I suppose, 
shall I feel really young again. We have all lived much 
since we last sat together in the dear old home. Things 
have changed. Never again can they be what they were 
in my boyhood days. 


AN INTERLUDE 267 

And yet, perchance, such change is but one of the grow- 
ing pains that we must all go through. My mother says 
this, and no doubt, as usual, she is right. Sometimes I 
marvel at her patience. Patience, I fear, is one of the 
lessons I have yet to learn. No doubt good will be the 
end of all this suffering, for so many, yet that end seems 
still too far off to be seen. I would hurry the months if 
I could. 

In the meantime, Mackenzie is at Navy Island, in the 
Niagara River, about three miles above the Falls, — but 
of that later. 


CHAPTER XXIX 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 

I DO not know what date it is, for I have utterly lost 
track of the days and have forgotten to ask. 
“Tempus is fugitin’ ” Hank used to say, laughingly, in the 
good old days, but indeed, when events pile upon events, 
as in these perilous days, and when tragedy and comedy, 
swift doing and deadly do-nothingness crowd upon one as 
upon me of late, one begins to wonder whether Time flies 
at all, or whether it but revolves about on itself in an un- 
ceasing hurly-burly. 

— And now something of the days that have passed since 
my last writing of the things that have been transpiring 
in Toronto. 

I cannot remember the day — but that does not matter 
in the least. — At any rate I was in the apothecary shop. 
Nora had come in and was talking with two richly dressed 
ladies who had come for some trifling articles. Oddly 
enough I remember that one of the articles was rosemary 
soap and another attar of roses, which is in much favor 
with a few of our grande dames, notwithstanding its cost. 

I had returned to the desk, and was sitting there trying 
to absorb myself in some formulae, and none too happily — 
for I had just seen another batch of prisoners brought in 
in sleighs, with a posse of armed men on horseback, behind 
and before, — when my name was spoken in a gruff whisper 
by someone who had entered the shop. 

There was something in the whispered voice, as well as 
in the unaccustomed “Alan” that was of the old home, and 
almost I sprang from the chair. 

Between me and the light of the window loomed the 
268 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 269 

huge form of Big Bill, but so changed that I hardly knew 
him. His face was haggard, a sickly yellow, beneath the 
thatch of unkempt hair shoved down by his cap ; his mouth 
was half open, as if in fear, and even his bushy beard 
could not conceal the trembling of his lips. 

“Alan,” he said again, as I stood staring at him, but he 
shuffled his feet like a man ill at ease. 

“Well, Bill, old fellow!” I said. “How are you?” 

He did not seem to notice my proffered hand, but came 
close to me, looking this way and that, at the door, at the 
window, and at the two ladies and Nora. 

“Isn’t there a place where I kin talk to ye alone?” he 
asked. 

“Why,” I said, “I suppose we can go into the clockshop. 
It’s been empty, of people at least, ever since Clinkenbocker 
went off to the rebellion.” 

And so, with Nora’s eyes following curiously, and even 
a bit anxiously, we went out at the back and into the 
deserted workroom of the clockmaker, where, among the 
soundless clocks, short and tall, we sat down. 

Again I held out my hand. 

He looked at it, then away again without touching it. 

“Why, what’s the matter, Bill?” I asked. “Won’t you 
shake hands with me?” 

And then he broke down and blubbered like a child. 

I could not imagine what could be the matter with him; 
but I had to wait until he had gained control of himself 
and had scrubbed his eyes with a red and yellow hand- 
kerchief. 

“What’s the matter, Bill?” I repeated, then, “Can I help 
you ?” 

“Help me !” he exclaimed, excitedly. “Help me ? It’s fer 
shootin’ me ye’ll be, Alan, when ye know what I’ve done! 
An’ I’ll be the last one to blame ye if ye do. — Wait a 
minit an’ I’ll tell ye,— I’ll tell ye!” 

“Well, go ahead, then,” I said, sitting down beside him. 

He blew his nose stentoriously, as though by way of 
fortification, and then braced himself. 


270 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“I want to tell ye,” he said. — “I was alwus greedy fer 
the pounds and shillin’s, Alan, — ye know that, — though I 
only wanted to spend it wild, mebbe. An’ it’s been the 
ruin of me. I’ve heerd the minister tell of Judas, an’ how 
he felt when he went out an’ hanged hisself. I know , now.” 

He stopped, and I waited in silence, — a silence that 
seemed uncanny, with all the clocks standing about still, 
as though they were holding their breath to listen. 

“I never thought nohow they’d be put to’t so hard,” he 
went on. “I thought it ’ud be a year or so in jail, mebbe, 
an’ that ’ud be the end on’t. An’ I was keen fer the money. 
Ye see I’d thought first o’ buyin’ the tavern, an’ then, when 
yer father paid me cash down fer the farm I wanted some- 
thin’ bigger’n the tavern, an’ there was a chance o’ buyin’ 
another one in Buffalo — my wife’s brother wrote to me 
about it — wanted me to go in with him buyin’ it. . . . About 
that time folks said they were payin’ so much a head fer 
informin’ on the rebels, an’ ” 

Again he paused and moved his feet, and I became sud- 
denly suspicious of impending evil. 

“Go on,” I said. 

“Well,” desperately, — “They’re arrested. 

“Arrested? — Who ?” 

“All o’ them — all o’ them at home that was left that 
was Reformers, — yer father too.” 

“My father? Never my father !” 

He stood up and reached his two hands towards me. 

“ ’Fore the Lord, Alan,” he said, thickly “I never thought 
it ’ud be much,— an’ now they’re sayin’ it’s all to be hangin’ 
an’ sendin’ to somewheres over the sea. — Mebbe ye kin 
do somethin’, Alan. ’Fore the Lord, I never meant to 
do much harm! If I could take it all back I’d tear the 
tongue out o’ me head!” 

“Where is my father?” I demanded, shaking him as a 
terrier might shake a rat. 

“In the jail, mebbe, by this time. They was brought in 
this afternoon in sleighs. — ’Fore the Lord, Alan ” 

But his further excuse did not reach me, and his voice 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 


271 

died away in a far-off rumbling of gruff noise in which 
words were lost. — So deaf do our ears become when the 
mind is wrenched from the body. . . . My father, then, had 
been one of those taken past an hour ago, and I had not 
known, nor had he been able to make sign ! 

Like a man in a daze I must have stood there, yet I doubt 
not I was glaring like a tiger at Big Bill, since I felt 
rather than saw that he seemed to cringe and shrink in his 
chair. When the consciousness of reasoning returned to 
me my first impulse was to set upon him and fight all 
the fury in me out with him. . . . Then, the piteousness of 
him came to me. . . . And then, quite inexplicably — for 
who can explain the forces that govern these strange na- 
tures of ours? — a picture flashed before me, soft and far- 
away yet clear in every detail, — a peaceful scene of a har- 
vest-field, with men following the last load into a little 
barn, and Big Bill, with his fork over his shoulder, walk- 
ing last of all with The Schoolmaster. . . . The picture 
was of that day upon which I had returned, hopeless, after 
my long searching for Barry. 

It passed . . . and I saw that Big Bill was still looking 
up at me with the piteousness of a hunted animal. 

“I never got the money,” he went on, catching again my 
attention, “1 never even tried to git it — if ’twas to be got. 
When I heerd really how things was, I tried to head off 
the p’lice er whoever they was, but they’d got ahead o’ me. 
An’ so I follyed them all the way here — an’ missed ’em. — 
But mebbe you kin do somethin’, Alan. I’ll go with ye to 
swear to it all, wherever it’s needin’ to go. I’ll go, — sure’s 
death I will.” 

He was for starting off at once, but still I did not 
speak, but sat looking at him. I was wondering if taking 
him before the Chief Justice was the only means of securing 
immediate freedom for my father. . . . Was not this man 
before me a criminal before the law? — Or was his self- 
confession sufficient to secure him a ready pardon? . . . 
True, I had no great love for Big Bill, yet I hated to land 
him into the jail. I remembered his wife and little Janie, 


272 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

and, besides, Big Bill was not all bad. With all his faults 
his wife loved him, and little Janie adored him. There was 
a new glimmering of manhood in him, too, as he sat there, 
after his hard ride, trying to undo the wrong he had done. 
. . . Upon the other hand, was not the law The Law — 
a machine that would brook no compromise ? And was not 
I myself culpable if I failed to deliver this offender into 
the hands of judgment? . . . — Upon all this I was not 
very clear. Truly I knew more of poetry and music and 
such like than of these hard-and-fast legal “yeas” and 
“nays/’ ignorance of which was now standing me in such 
poor stead. — If I could only consult with Uncle Joe 

Presently a way seemed to open itself. 

“See here, Bill,” I said. “You’re in dead earnest about 
this?” 

“ ’Fore the Lord, Alan, ” 

But he did not need to explain. He was as ready as a 
frightened child to do anything I demanded of him. 

“Will you do this, then?” I asked. “Will you go up to 
my uncle’s — and stay there — until I come home ?” 

“I’ll do anything ye say, Alan.” 

Even as he spoke I was scribbling a note with a pencil. 

“Unless the Doctor is there, don’t say a word about all 
this to any of them. Just give them this — and wait.” 

“I’ll do that, Alan,” eagerly, — “if ye’ll tell me how to git 
there.” 

Carefully I explained the way — there was no chance of 
missing it— then took him back through the apothecary 
shop. 

“Now, off with you,” I said, and forthwith bundled him 
out on to the street. 

The ladies had gone, and Nora was alone. 

“Lucky you were here, Nora,” I said. “Will you keep 
the shop for a while?” And then I told her, very briefly, 
what had happened. 

“Where are you going now ?” she asked. 

“To the jail first, and then to the Chief Justice. Where’s 
Uncle Joe?” 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 


273 

“Away out the Kingston Road somewhere. I don’t think 
he’ll be home before dark.” 

Without a word further she began to take off her cap and 
cloak, and I jerked on my greatcoat and was off on a run. 
Already too much time had been wasted. I arrived at the 
jail in no time. The snow all about it was trampled with 
the marks of many feet. 

There was a wait before I could see the jailer, but little 
further trouble. Evidently I was still looked upon as a 
good loyalist. Indeed the turnkey did not even so much as 
remain very near after he had taken me to my father, but 
stood at a little distance while I talked through the small 
grated opening. Neither he nor the jailer had the slightest 
idea that it was my father whom I sought to see; indeed 
both of them had called me by my Uncle Joe’s surname, a 
thing that, for some reason, has been often done since my 
coming to the city. 

There were four of them huddled together in the place, — 
father, Mickey Feeley and two others from beyond the 
Village; and glad, in a way, was I to see Mickey there, for 
I knew he would be like a fresh breeze to them all. 

Breeze enough did they need, for the place was cold and 
damp, and even now seemed breathed out, the air heavy 
and ill-smelling, with no light except from one little barred 
window which could not be opened at all, and no air except 
what could creep through under the door, and, when it 
chanced to be opened, the little patch of grating opening 
on the corridor. 

My father made very light of it. They would likely be 
soon brought to trial, he thought, and there was not the 
ghost of a chance of a conviction. They’d be home before 
long, he said. But he looked worried, and I felt that 
the brave words were for me. He knew, better than I, the 
slowness with which the red tape of the law must be un- 
rolled. 

As for Mickey, “Shure it’s the foine gintlemen we’ll be,” 
he said, “wid niver a t’ing to do but twiddle our t’umbs, an’ 


274 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

our vittles brought to us reglar as the clock sthrikes. Shure 
an’ it’s not delft we’ll be continted to ate of whin we go 
back, at all, at all. It’s the tin plate we’ll be callin’ fer.” 

I stayed just long enough to learn all the particulars, then 
took my departure. My mind was now clear as to what I 
should do. 

“Write to your mother, lad,” were my father’s parting 
words. “Tell her not to worry, and to be sure to get Jim’s 
Hannah to stay with her.” 

From the jail I went straight to the office of the Chief 
Justice, but he was not there, and would not be back for 
some little time. . . . From there to the Government House, 
reaching there sometime near the dinner hour when His 
Excellency was fairly likely to be home. 

But evidently an eager young man, with neither cards 
nor credentials, could not break through the walls of cere- 
mony that guarded the Lieutenant-Governor, for, after 
some further delay, I was informed that Sir Francis could 
not give me audience then. 

Outside, on the snowy sidewalk I stood for a moment 
considering what I should do. 

“I’ll make another try for the Chief Justice,” I said to 
myself. “He’ll be at home now.” And off I went again. 

Beverley House is low and elegant rather than grand and 
imposing, and when I reached it I wondered if the family 
were away, for it appeared to be quite in darkness. Closer, 
however, a ray of light could be seen at one or two of the 
windows, and then it appeared that the heavy curtains 
had been drawn across to prevent anyone from seeing from 
the outside, evidently a precaution in these perilous days, 
for usually the windows of the Chief Justice’s home are 
quite unguarded, with the curtains left carelessly open, so 
that passers-by can see, if they will, the cosy interior, with 
its many candles and sconces and candelabra. 

Almost instantly my knock was answered, and I stepped 
into a broad low hall, in which a fire was burning at the 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 


275 

farther end. Everywhere the coloring was softer and more 
harmonious than I had yet seen. There were tall plants, 
and, springing as it were from the midst of them, from 
the top of a pedestal, a gleaming statue of a slender and 
beautiful youth, poised on one toe, in the act of running. 

“Surely it is Mercury, messenger of the gods,” I said to 
myself — for only the night before I had read a description 
of this fair youth in a book of mythology — and, being left 
alone for a moment, I leaned forward to see if there were 
wings on the heels of the figure, being much gratified to 
perceive that they were there. I would have examined 
more closely had not the maid who admitted me returned, 
saying, somewhat to my surprise, that His Honor was 
ready to receive me. I had apprehended more difficulty. 

Forthwith she ushered me into a small room, in which 
was the Chief Justice himself. He was standing by the 
fireplace reading a letter, but glanced up as I entered, giv- 
ing me a keen look that seemed to probe me through and 
through. Then he motioned to me to be seated, and, for 
a few moments, went on with his reading. 

— I think I have before remarked that he is one of the 
handsomest men I have ever seen, and one of the most 
aristocratic in appearance, tall, and dignified in bearing, with 
a keen clear-cut face. 

Finally, when he had ended, he put the letter very care- 
fully in a leather wallet, and placed the wallet in a desk. 
Observing him closely as he moved, it seemed to me that 
here was a man who would do whatever he did deliberately, 
swayed neither by emotion nor impulse, as great a contrast 
from Uncle Joe as could well be imagined. — Something of 
the idealist, too, as might be judged from the height of his 
brow and the delicacy of his hands. 

After that he sat down, turned towards me, put his long 
white fingers together, and asked, 

“Well, young man, what can I do for you?” 

“It’s about my father,” I said. “He’s been arrested. 
That was all a mistake, sir. He had nothing to do with 


27 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

the rebellion from start to finish. On the contrary, he 
thought it ill-advised.” 

“Your father?” he repeated, raising his eye-brows a little, 
so that I wondered if any hint in regard to my connection 
with Uncle Joe had connected itself with me in his mind. 

“Yes, my father,” I said. “He’s in the jail now.” Then 
I proceeded to tell him the story of Big Bill. 

He listened with interest, keeping his scrutinizing gaze 
on my face. 

When I had ended he stood up, paced the room two or 
three times, then sat down again, closer to me, which seemed 
to me a good augury. 

“Where is this — this Big Bill?” he asked. 

“Why, he’s at ” I began, and then stopped in con- 

fusion, for fear of compromising my uncle in any way 
because of my own relationship to him. — “He’s at — I’ll bring 
him to you, sir.” 

Instantly I had a feeling that, in some way, I had 
quenched his growing interest in me. 

He smiled, rather coldly. 

“Well, well, it’s the old story,” he said. “I’ve been in- 
terviewed already in regard to a few scores of people who 
have had ‘nothing to do with the rebellion.’ The fact re- 
mains that they have been arrested and that those who have 
made the arrests sometimes have another story to tell. I’m 
afraid, my dear young man, that you will have to wait. 
Inquiry will be made into all these cases with as great de- 
spatch as possible. In the meantime let us see this — this 
Big Bill.” 

“But my father can’t stand the jail even for a short time,” 
I exclaimed. “It’s cold and damp, and he takes the 
rheumatism.” 

Again he smiled. 

“I find that the rheumatism is a very common disease,” 
he said, which exasperated me somewhat, so that I felt my 
Irish blood rising, and my Scots stubbornness, too; but I 
managed to keep my temper in leash, and to say, civilly 
enough, 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 277 

“I may as well tell you, sir, that the only — rebel — in our 
house was myself. My father had absolutely nothing to 
do with it.” 

“ You a rebel?” he said, flashing his penetrating glance 
upon me. 

“Yes, sir,” I replied. “I was at Montgomery’s with the 
rebels. — Now, sir, will you let me go to the jail and let my 
father go home?. My mother is in great distress, sir.” 

He arose and walked up and down the room again, hands 
behind his back, gaze bent on the floor as though in study, 
but whether of my own case or of something quite foreign 
I could not in the least conjecture. Then he sat down 
again. 

“Will you be good enough to tell me the whole story ?” he 
said, “ — Or at least as much of it as is pertinent.” 

“With pleasure, sir,” I said, and thereupon told him as 
much as concerned my father and me, and others who, I 
knew, had been unjustly arrested. 

To it all he listened very intently. — I have observed that 
men who achieve in anything whatever invariably have this 
faculty of intense concentration. — Then, when I had con- 
cluded, he remained quite motionless, regarding me with his 
steady, penetrating look. 

So long did his scrutiny last that it was fast becoming 
embarrassing, if not positively painful, and I was casting 
about for something to say to break it, when there came a 
terrific thumping at the outer door; and immediately the 
excited voice of Uncle Joe, loudly demanding to see His 
Honor. 

Instantly a smile passed over the Chief Justice’s coun- 
tenance, irradiating it as a burst of sunshine may irradiate a 
stern November sky. 

“Ah, the Doctor,” he said, arising and going to the door 
of the room. 

But Uncle Joe was at it already, with his hat in one hand 
and his walking-stick in the other, red to the top of his 
precious bald head. . . . — And behind him, in the hall. 


278 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

like a grim Caliban crept into all the beauty of it, lurched 
the hulking form of Big Bill. 

“I've come to see you, Robinson/’ began my uncle, “about 
my brother-in-law, my sister Mary’s husband. He’s been 
arrested. A damn shame, sir! A damn shame! He had 
about as much to do with the rebellion as I had. Not a 
whit more, sir ! Not a whit more ! And there he is in the 
jail, just as if he had been one of Mackenzie’s own pack! 
— I tell you it’s damnable, sir ! It’s damnable ! — This fellow 

’ll tell you about it ! This fellow ” turning towards the 

hall 

With that he espied me, and stopped short. 

“Good Lord, Alan,” he exclaimed. “Have you been here 
ever since? Nora told me you left the shop three hours 
ago.” 

The Chief Justice was smiling at us quite genially, and 
here finding an opening in which to speak, drew forth a 
chair. 

“Sit down, Doctor ; sit down,” he said, reseating himself 
as Uncle Joe complied, Big Bill, meanwhile, partly sub- 
merging himself by collapsing upon a chair, much too small 
for him, in the hall. 

“This young man — your nephew, is he?” went on the 
Chief Justice, — “has just been telling me all about it. He 
insists that he alone is the rebel, and that he be sent to 
the jail in his father’s place.” 

“What!” exclaimed Uncle Joe, sitting up very straight. 

“He insists,” repeated the Chief Justice, “that he alone 
is the rebel and that he be sent to jail in his father’s place.” 

Gradually the light of a great understanding spread over 
my uncle’s countenance, and then instantly his excitement 
left him. Upon him settled the indescribable dignity and 
tenderness that I have seen come to him once or twice in 
great crises of life and death, when a man’s life, — or maybe 
a child’s — hung in the balance. Slowly he turned towards 
me, looking at me so long ancf earnestly that I wondered 
what he would say, the Chief Justice, meanwhile, waiting as 
did I. . . . Then a misty wave of tenderness came into the 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 279 

brave Irish gray eyes — so like the eyes of my mother and 
now more than ever — and at last, still slowly, he turned 
back to Mr. Robinson. 

“He has told you that?” he said. “He has told you the 
whole story?” 

“All that is necessary, I believe.” 

“And it’s all true, worse luck!” said my uncle, “and I 
suppose I’m a culpable old criminal” — smiling — “for not 
having handed him over to the law. Well, that’s neither 
here nor there. I’m willing to take my punishment. — But 
I couldn’t altogether blame the lad. — Honest before God, I 
couldn’t ! He’s at the age, Robinson — you know that. 
You know what I mean. He’s at the age when a William 
Lyon Mackenzie can be a William Tell, or a Kossuth, or a 
Mazzini. You know that. And we’ll not say it’s all to 
the lad’s discredit either. — All his life he’s been in an at- 
mosphere where he’s seen the other side; he can talk, and 
with good argument too, when he’s put to it. Why, sir, 
the thing’s got to be principle with him to stand on what he 
thinks is the side of the people. I’m not so sure there’s 
anything so intrinsically wrong about that, Robinson; only 
a bit of misguiding, perhaps, as to the way in which the 
people are to be best served. And I’ll be blowed if I don’t 
think myself, sometimes, that maybe they haven’t had a 
fair deal. ... As for his father, I’ll stake my honor that 
there isn’t a man in all Upper Canada that stands more 
firmly for all that’s highest in what the British Empire 
stands for.” 

To all this the Chief Justice listened with courteous 
deference. 

“That may be,” he replied, when my uncle paused. “The 
fact remains that, according to his own admission ” 

“ — According to his own voluntary declaration, you 
mean,” corrected my uncle. 

“Well, then, — according to his own voluntary declaration 
— he has borne arms with a mob gathered in rebellion 
against Her Majesty’s Government.” 

The Chief Justice turned to me. 


280 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“ — Against the existing Government,” I made bold to 
say. 

The Chief Justice smiled, and Uncle Joe looked worried. 

“However,” resumed the Chief Justice, “that is a matter 
for later sifting. . . . And now, young man,” addressing me 
again, “what do you propose to do?” 

“Stay right on the steps of the jail, if need be,” I replied, 
“until my father is liberated.” 

He frowned slightly. 

“Indeed?” he said. 

Evidently I was a white elephant on the Chief Justice’s 
hands, and this probably Uncle Joe divined, for he came 
to the assistance of the dignitary of the law. 

“The lad’s word is as good as your word or mine, or 
your bond or mine, for that matter,” he said. “You may 
take it from me, Robinson, if he says he’ll stay, he’ll stay.” 

The Chief Justice bowed, and, at once, I arose. 

At that moment it was that Big Bill came into evidence. 

Forgetting the overpoweringness of the Chief Justice’s 
presence, and the unwonted and beautiful surroundings, he 
thrust himself into the midst of us. 

“Ye’re not goin’ to the jail, Alan?” 

“It’s the only thing to do, Bill,” I replied. 

“Not goin’ to give yerself up, all alone?” 

“There’s nothing else for it, Bill.” 

“Then I’m goin’ with you,” . he said. “Mister Lawyer,” 
addressing the Chief Justice, “if he kin do it, I kin. I 
knowed all along I did a thing I’d be jailed fer, an’ I’ve 
been waitin’ fer ye to put the handcuffs on. But if Alan 
kin go to the jail without no magistrate ner nothin’ I guess 
I kin.” 

So Big Bill and I went out of the house together, and I 
honored the Chief Justice for this pledge of his insight 
into even a rough man’s soul. His keen eyes had perceived 
that the poor blundering giant had put upon himself fetters 
more binding than any the forge could make or the lock- 
smith devise. 

As we went down the steps, too, I had a distinct feeling 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 281 

that he was relieved that no less artistic action had been 
necessary to get rid of us. Officers of the law, with 
shackles, would have been a sad blur in that spot of beauty, 
with its plants, and soft lights, and the young messenger of 
the gods, winged-heeled. — But perhaps the sense of his re- 
lief was all in my own soul. 

Well, I am writing this in the jail, glad enough for so 
long a story to while away something of its tedium. Of my 
experiences here I care not to write, although I have reason 
to believe I fare better than the most of the others. — It is 
the atmosphere of the place that I detest, and the knowing 
that all about me, behind these walls, grim tragedy holds 
v revel. 

My father has gone home, for the Chief Justice was as 
good as his word and secured immediate release for him; 
but my dear mother is here, and comes to see me every 
day. Also Uncle Joe and Nora come every day, and Aunt 
Octavia and Kate very often, and even Anne’s dainty feet 
have found way to my door. 

In ordinary times I might have been let out on trust, 
until the time of my trial, but in these troublous days there 
is nothing of that. 

— My trial? How strange that sounds! Yet am I glad 
that Hank and The Schoolmaster, and Jimmy and Dick are 
safe out of it, and well across the border. . . . And — 
whatever may come to me — I am thankful that my father, 
anxious though he may be over me, has escaped these cells 
and the strain of the court proceedings. But once did I set 
foot in a courtroom, and even yet the memory of it is a 
nightmare to me, — all the more, perhaps, since I am so soon 
to face it again, and with a more intimate interest. It was 
a few days before my coming here, and, of course, some 
of the rebels were up for trial. Even yet I can feel it, as 
it comes back to me: the sea of heads (for the courtrooms 
are packed, these days, at every trial) ; the heavy air; the 
faces upon faces, some merely frankly curious, some 
anxious, yet many hard and sneering — for the rebels are in 


282 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


poor repute; the counsel and jury in their places, and the 
one man seated on high to judge (it was not the Chief 
Justice that day) as though he were the Lord Almighty and 
could see into the recesses of the hearts of men. — And yet 
I do know that so long as there is crime and blundering 
in the world such tribunals must be. At least, no better 
plan has yet been devised. . . . Sorriest of all was the 
prisoner’s bench. There was a man of about my father’s 
age “up” that day. He was bent a little from hard work; 
his face was white already from the foul air of his cell 
and the lack of exercise; his locks of iron-gray hair were a 
little rough, despite his evident attempts at proper grooming. 
... I did not wait to hear the verdict. 

Uncle Joe tells me every time he comes that my turn 
will not be long delayed, and that I shall be sure to be 
acquitted. It is not as if I had been in it since the begin- 
ning. 

Well, we shall see what we shall see. 

This afternoon he stayed to the very last second per- 
mitted him. 

In reply to my question as to how the sentences were 
going, he was somewhat evasive, I thought. Perhaps he 
did not wish to worry me, for he has a great idea of the 
influence of the state of the mind upon the health of the 
body. 

“After all, you can’t blame the judges if they have to be 
a bit severe on some of them,” he said. “They’re only 
instruments of the Law, — and there has to be Law for the 
good of society. Now, there’s Robinson, for instance — a 
high and loyal gentleman. There’s not another man in 
Upper Canada in whose hands the administration of the 
law would be safer. — And in this matter of the rebellion, 
of course, there’s precedent. — There’s always precedent. If 
the Law has to act harshly at this time, with the ring- 
leaders, why it’s inevitable. We can’t let this country turn 
into a nest of disloyalty and anarchy.” 

He spoke wearily, and, despite himself, sadly ; yet as one 
who sees but one way out. 


BIG BILL’S REPENTANCE 283 

— So there it is, I thought, — the one point of view and 
the other, the one cast of mind and the other. And what 
can be done about it ? 

“As for you, Alan,” he concluded, smiling and trying to 
be facetious, “you’ll be soon out of this. You young spal- 
peen, you know you’re not even half a rebel!” 

Of that, I think, he is trying to persuade himself. 

This evening a turnkey, also, talked with me, and told me 
some things that I have not heretofore heard. He, too, I 
believe, thinks me less than half a rebel, and so is disposed 
to be over lenient. Our prison, he says, is far too greatly 
overcrowded, as are also the jails at London, Hamilton, 
Simcoe and elsewhere, so much so, that the men have to 
be herded together in the cells like cattle. The trials seem 
to come slowly, and already the men are beginning to while 
away the tedium of the time by whittling little trinkets, 
whenever they can obtain the necessary material, making 
little wooden boxes and other articles. All of their talk 
is of the folk at home, and whether the sentence is likely 
to be death, or banishment for life, for those who shall be 
deemed most culpable in the rebellion. There is great 
excitement, too, whenever new prisoners are brought in, 
some of whom tell harrpwing tales of the miseries encoun- 
tered in their ineffectual efforts to escape. — And yet these 
last, because of having been out in the pure fresh open, 
are not usually in such sorry case as those in the cells, who, 
because of the cold and dampness, and the fetid air, and 
the lack of opportunities for cleanliness, suffer much misery, 
so that many of them are becoming seriously ill. 

Most pitiful of all, perhaps, are the cases of Peter Mat- 
thews and that fine old gentleman, Colonel Van Egmond, 
Matthews having been placed in solitary confinement, fet- 
tered with irons, in the most wretched dungeon of all, 
while the aged Colonel has become so ill that it may be 
necessary to have him removed to the hospital. . . . 
Matthews, the turnkey says, sometimes talks through the 
cracks under the door, to his fellow prisoners near by, tell- 


284 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

ing them to be of good cheer, he himself being solicitous 
chiefly for the escape of Lount and others among his 
friends. 

In the cell in which I am confined there are two other 
lads. 

They, too, have been writing letters — which must be 
read by alien eyes before they set forth in the mail-bags. 

One of them has just finished his. 

“Do you know what day tomorrow is?” he asks, turning 
to me. 

“No.” 

“Neither do I. Heigh-ho!” with a yawn, “I wish the 
time would go a bit faster. It’s confoundedly slow.” 


CHAPTER XXX 


THE AFTERMATH 

T HIS is Sunday night, but I am in no mood for sleep, 
hence will spend some time with my Journal. 

It is the 28th of January, and perhaps eleven of the clock, 
and I have just come in from taking Anne to her home, 
finding, on my return, Pinky and Arthur Rusholme (Nora’s 
latest admirer) on the point of leaving. 

All the evening the three have been here, and the rest of 
us have been much entertained by the tales of the two 
young men (who are both in the militia) of their exploits 
along the Niagara River, where they have been, of late, 
with Colonel MacNab’s forces. 

So far as I myself was concerned, there was something 
ludicrous in the situation. For here was I, who bore my 
rifle with “rebel” Mackenzie’s men at Montgomery’s but 
some seven weeks ago, and even spent some time in prison 
for it, sitting there in a loyalist’s house, quite comfortably 
and somewhat diverted, listening to stories told by two other 
staunch loyalists of the final discomfiture of my former 
leader in the miserable fiasco at Navy Island! 

Nevertheless, in this I feel quite conscience-clear. I have 
no sympathy whatever with Mackenzie’s present efforts 
against Canada, and no will at all to join myself with the 
rabble of filibusters who, of late, have allied themselves 
with him. My quarrel — that of the majority of the “pa- 
triots” who met at Montgomery’s — was not against Great 
Britain, but wholly against the abuses that have been al- 
lowed to accumulate (whatever may be said to the con- 
trary) in this country. We did not want to break loose 
from Great Britain; we did not want independence; we 

285 


286 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


wanted removal of grievances, — that and nothing more. In- 
deed, I do think that Mackenzie himself wanted no more 
than that at the beginning, and that his present course is 
altogether through desperation; for I yet believe him to 
be a serious-minded man, all for the people and not at all 
out for fame, as these Tories would have one believe. 

However that may be, since his escape to the United 
States he has declared himself openly enough as seeking a 
breakage of this country from British connection, and, 
through equal desperation with his own, a number of 
Canadian refugees have again rallied about him. I doubt, 
however, — while it must be admitted that a few high- 
minded men have of late joined with him — whether his re- 
cent adherents number many of the best of those who came 
together at Montgomery’s that week in December, or, in- 
deed, many of the best of our neighbors over the border. 
The majority of those who flocked to his standard at Navy 
Island and have since made one issue with him, is made up, 
it appears, of that riff-raff of men who may be found in 
any place, and who are all for excitement, caring little 
how or where it may be obtained. A number, too, may 
have been dazzled by the glowing promises of reward of- 
fered by Mackenzie in case Canada should be captured. 

The marvelous thing to me is that our former leader 
should have moved with such celerity. The affair at Mont- 
gomery’s took place on December the seventh. On the 
evening of December the twelfth he and Van Rensselaer 
(his United States colleague) went in a scow to Navy 
Island; and before we in Toronto knew what was happen- 
ing, armed men were swarming on the Island and on the 
United States mainland, and he had gone so far as to 
name a “Provisional Government” and set a two-starred 
flag flying above the pine shanty which was to serve as its 
headquarters pro tern! 

“The whole thing struck me as comedy laughed Arthur 
Rusholme, in speaking of the denouement , this afternoon; 
and, now that the first scene is all over, I fear it strikes 
me in the same light. But at the time there was excitement 


THE AFTERMATH 


287 

enough here in Toronto, with reports running wild so that 
one might have thought half the United States marching 
in arms on Canada, and the militia hurrying off, with num- 
bers of the Reformers with them at that, — for since Mac- 
kenzie has shown this last card most of his old supporters 
have turned quite against him, and some have even gone 
over to the Government. . . . All this, however, is due, I 
think, to the excitement of the time, for as yet the abuses 
for which we took up arms have not been righted. There 
was a “cause” — and it is yet with us. 

All that, however, is neither here nor there at this time, 
and it remains here to record that, so expeditious were the 
preparations here and elsewhere that very soon at Chippewa, 
just opposite the Island, there were assembled, under Colo- 
nel MacNab, twenty-five hundred men, with more coming 
in every day. 

“By Jove, yes! Wasn't it a comedy?” laughed Pinky, in 
reply to Rusholme’s remark. Then, turning to us, “There 
we were, like two curs yapping at each other from the one 
shore to the other. Here were we on our shore with our 
cannon, parading every day to show how strong we were; 
and there were they over on the Island, felling trees and 
building up barricades, with their few little cannon down 
at the water’s edge spitting across at us two or three times 
a day, and our fellows running after the balls as if they had 
been foot-balls at Rugby. By Jove, it was rare sport!” 

“The river seemed the only tragic thing about it,” said 
Rusholme. “I hadn’t seen it, up there, before” (he has 
but recently come out from England), “and it always looked 
to me — sinister, — sort of oily on top, you know, as though 
it wanted to lie about the depths and currents underneath.” 

“I thought it looked tragic enough the night the Caroline 
went over,” added Pinky, “and yet — well that had a fine 
stage effect, too,” and he laughed again, twirling his mus- 
tache and looking unutterable things at Kate. 

“That was the one thing I’m sorry I missecl,” responded 
Rusholme. “I’d have given my ears to have been one of the 
men in those picked boat-loads that went over with Drew 


288 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 


to cut her loose. — I could have done it, too,” he added en- 
thusiastically. “At least I think I could. I didn’t pull an 
oar at the Cambridge regattas for nothing.” 

— And then, between them, followed a description, too 
long to be put down here in detail, of how the five little 
boats on that night set out from Whisky Point, pushing 
silently into the darkness over the treacherous water, Drew’s 
boat leading with a port-fire over the stern; of how the 
plucky venturers made an attack, with musket and cutlass, 
at Fort Schlosser, finally cutting the vessel loose; and of 
how, somewhere about midnight, MacNab’s men, watching 
eagerly from the Chippewa shore, saw her float slowly out, 
all ablaze, towards the center of the stream, where she 
swung about and drifted on, faster and faster, towards the 
great, thundering Cataract below. 

“It was worth seeing,” said Rusholme, “and yet there 
seemed something horribly cold-blooded about standing 
there watching. We thought then that she might be 
crowded with men. Some of our fellows even imagined 
they could see them moving about.” 

After that the story went on of how the daring boatmen 
came back, with shots rattling after them, finally pulling in 
again out of the darkness, greeted by the cheers of the 
loyalists on the shore. 

All these events took place on the night of December the 
twenty-ninth. Subsequently, Sir John Colborne sent artil- 
lery to Chippewa, which opened such vigorous fire on the 
Island that it was speedily vacated, not, however, before 
three of the militia had been killed by shots from the “little 
cannon down by the water” on the shore of the Island. 

Since that, I may remark, nothing of great importance 
has occurred, although the Province is kept in continual 
ferment because of threatened invasions at this or that point 
along the frontier. The fact that the Caroline — a United 
States vessel in United States waters — was destroyed by 
our militia, has, it is true, caused vexatious international 
disagreement between this country and the country over the 
border, which still hangs fire; but more immediate trouble 


THE AFTERMATH 289 

may be threatened by various societies known as “Hunters’ 
Lodges,” which are being formed along the border, whose 
great end and object is the taking of Canada, with rich 
prizes to all the so-called “Friends of Liberty” who take 
part. 

Evidently it behooves us to be on the alert. 

In the meantime the trials go on tediously, as though they 
would never end. 

Poor Lount, I may add, is now in the Toronto jail. 

After leaving Montgomery’s on that tragic December 
day, he and one Edward Kennedy made away together, hop- 
ing to reach the United States. For days they traveled 
through the swamps and forests, their clothes torn, their 
shoes worn from their feet, half-starved, sleeping in hay- 
mows and straw-stacks, hounded ever from one place to 
another by eager pursuers. At last they reached the Lake 
Erie shore, and, engaging a man and a boy to take them 
over, set off across the lake in a small boat. ... For two 
days and two nights they buffeted against angry waves, their 
clothing wet, suffering extremely from cold and exhaustion ; 
then, at last, the friendly southern shore was in sight and 
liberty seemed at hand. . . . But the very elements ap- 
peared to be against the poor fugitives, for an off-shore 
wind speedily arose, which drove the boat back to Canada, 
where, almost immediately, they were arrested as smugglers, 
being afterwards identified and sent on to prison by zealous 
loyalists. 

Lount, they say, is now in like case with Captain Mat- 
thews, being heavily ironed and kept in a cell by himself, 
but, like him, keeps up his indomitable spirit, and even 
attempts to cheer the other prisoners whenever he finds 
opportunity to call a few words to them. 

I could not but think of all these men this evening while 
we sat so comfortably in Aunt Octavia’s drawing-room, 
with its many lights, and bright fires, and luxurious fur- 
nishings. 

Nor was the last crowning touch to civilization wanting, 


2 9 o THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

for fairer flowers than my two cousins and Anne were 
never seen in any garden of women. Kate, to be sure, is 
always the beauty; but the more piquant Nora was, as usual, 
the center of merriment, and roguish enough did she look 
this night in her blue, low-cut gown, with her hair in a 
shower of ringlets about her shoulders. 

Anne, too, is very beautiful. Tonight she wore some- 
thing green as an ocean-wave, above which her reddish 
hair, drawn high in puffs and bound with pearls, shone with 
the tints of rich hazel. 

Perhaps some day such beauty and sweetness may make 
appeal to my heart, should my circumstances, indeed, per- 
mit me to afford myself such daring, but at present I think 
I know why some men, and more women, choose to be 
forever celibate. 

I fear that some day I shall sell the holding of land by 
the river. — Yet it has a grip on me, too. 

Well, we shall see what the morrow will bring forth. 


CHAPTER XXXI 


TOMORROW ? 

A GAIN this city is in a state of great excitement. To- 
morrow morning, the nth of April, 1838, our leaders. 
Captain Samuel Lount and Captain Peter Matthews, are to 
be hanged in the jail yard at this place. — Our leaders? — Yes, 
they are still “our leaders” to all of us who shouldered arms 
to declare for our rights that day. 

Surely the bitter sentence must even yet be commuted! 
Surely banishment for life might well serve the demands 
of the Law! From all over the Province have come up 
petitions, signed by thousands of people — Tories as well as 
Reformers — begging for clemency. Even Indians from the 
Northern Lakes have come down to ask that Lount, their 
dear friend, might be permitted to live. A petition signed 
by five thousand people was presented by his wife to our 
new Lieutenant-Governor, and it is said she fell on her 
knees, weeping, as she begged for mercy. But to no avail. 
Perhaps the life of Sir George Arthur in Van Dieman’s 
Land has made him obdurate. I could wish this day that 
Sir Francis Bond Head were back among us; he, at least, 
knew us better. 

Tomorrow, — yet still we hope; 

— I can see them yet, the two men, with their honest, 
eager, serious faces, as we saw them that day at Mont- 
gomery’s. 

— I am sick at heart. 


291 


CHAPTER XXXII 


A BLOT ON HIS SCUTCHEON 

I T is over. 

At eight o’clock this morning the dire deed was accom- 
plished. 

They say the two men met their death with the utmost 
courage, — that their last words to their comrades of whom 
they took leave in the prison were words of cheer, bidding 
them never to be ashamed for what they had done, but to 
keep up a high heart, knowing that all the suffering was 
in a good cause. They say, too, that Lount’s last act was 
to look affectionately towards the windows of the jail, where 
could be seen the heart-broken faces of the prisoners in 
the cells. 

All this day I have kept indoors, trying to shut out the 
sounds and sights of the street. Impossible it is to me 
to understand the impulse which this day drove crowds of 
men to witness the last scene in the yard on Newgate 
Street. Would I could shut away my memory and my 
burning sense of wrong also, for a time, if I might gain 
a respite from this misery. 

I am yrriting this in the apothecary shop. It is almost 
night. 


29 2 


CHAPTER XXXIII 


A VISITOR IN THE GOLDEN- WINGED WOODS 

I AM sitting on a log that is quite overgrown with emerald 
moss. Everywhere I look, about, above, are sun- 
drenched leaves, between which may be seen, here and 
there, the dark bole of a tree or the tracery of gray branches. 
In my ears is the ripple of falling water, and as I raise nty 
eyes to look at the amber clearness of the stream my gaze 
passes over a tangle of fern and odorous mint, and tall 
meadow-rue white as a summer cloud. But in vain do I 
listen for the call of the white-throat, for the birds do not 
sing much at midsummer, being now busied with domestic 
affairs of their own. 

It is the old spot by the waterfall, but I have my Journal 
with me, for, for the first time since that dreadful day in 
April, I have felt impelled to take it down and write in it. 

This day there is a great gladness in my heart and many 
are happy in this Province. Just two days ago, on the 
29th day of June of this year of grace, 1838, the prison 
doors were opened, and scores of the “rebels” walked forth 
once more to the sunlight and the joys of home, — this com- 
ing to pass 011 the day of the coronation of our gracious 
young Queen, Victoria, and by order of Lord Durham who, 
towards the end of May, reached this country in the capa- 
city of High Commissioner, sent out to inquire into the 
causes of the Rebellion. Indeed, it seems that at last the 
Home Government has grasped the idea that there is need 
for some radical reform in this country, and we hope for 
great things as the result of His Lordship’s investigations. 

Just now, however, the most immediate cause of joy to 
me is the possibility that Hank may soon be back to us. 

293 


294 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

Jimmy and Hannah, for the present, appear to have settled 
down quite comfortably in Rochester. Dickie Jones is still 
a-roving on the other side, but of The Schoolmaster we 
have heard no news at all, and I much fear he may be 
among those ringleaders and others to whom the amnesty 
granted by Lord Durham was not extended. ... Yes, there 
are gaps in the chain of friendship which once bound us 
together here that shall never be replaced, and yet I am glad 
to work again in the old fields and to wander once more 
about the old haunts in the Golden-Winged Woods with 
Blucher at my heels. I have a strange and inexplicable 
presentiment that some day Barry will come to me here. 
Again and again I have seen her come to me in dreams — 
and always I have been here by the waterfall, and the woods 
have been swimming in the golden light of the summer, and 
always Blucher has been with me, as in the days that are 
beginning to seem now so far away. 

Just now he is barking vociferously at something at some 
little distance away. I wonder what he has found, — a 
groundhog, maybe, escaped to its hole in the ground. 

• •••••• 

Perhaps an hour ago I was stopped from my writing by 
the sound of footsteps, and, looking up, was surprised to 
see Old Meg slowly approaching, leaning heavily on her 
stick as she walked, with Blucher trotting along amiably 
at her side. She had takeA off her wide-brimmed hat, and 
again I was struck by the something about her face which, 
when she throws off her mask of levity or sarcasm, appears 
much above the ordinary in these parts. As she came on, 
framed in by the green depths of the forest, her skin looked 
brown as a butternut, and her wavy hair black as a black- 
bird’s wing; her bright, steady eyes seemed looking for 
me, and, despite her limping, there was about her the un- 
conscious dignity that I have seen in her at times before. 

“Why, Meg,” I said, arising. “This is an unexpected 
pleasure. I’m glad to see Blucher has made friends with 
you. I thought he was barking at a groundhog.” 

“Oh, the animals are never afraid of me,” she said. “It’s 


lYISITOR IN GOLDEN-WINGED WOODS 295 

only the humans who are that, finding my plain-speaking, 
at times, too much for their liking.” 

She sat down on the log and threw off her little black 
silk shawl, so that it fell on the undergrowth at her feet. 

“Hi-ho !” she said, with a sigh of relief. “It’s weary 
walking through the woods when one’s old and lame, the 
stick sinks into the soft soil. It was made for the young 
and strong like you, Alan, not for such as me. — I thought 
you’d be here, Alan.” 

“Why did you think so?” I asked. 

She laughed. 

“Oh, by the power that’s in me,” she said. “When all 
else fails I’ll proclaim myself a fortune-teller. — Do you 
know, I bent the crown of my hat to a peak the other day, 
and put on my shawl, and looked in the mirror, leaning on 
my stick. You’ll guess what a fine witch I made.” 

“You mustn’t do that,” I laughed, responding to her 
merry mood. “They’ll be burning you for the next mur- 
rain on the cattle.” 

She took up a little twig and snapped it. 

“Oh,” she said. “There are more ways than one of being 
burned at the stake, and I’ve been through a fire or two 
already. They burned some of the nonsense out of me, 
and for a while, I thought, the milk of human sympathy too. 
— But then she came and I found I still had a heart.” 

“She?” I inquired, but I knew already what she would 
say. 

“It’s not needing to tell you 'who’ it’ll be,” she replied. 
“Well you know the only one who ever came here who 
could resurrect the heart of Old Meg. ... I see her here 
everywhere, Alan” — circling her hand towards the green 
shades. “As I came in I saw her dancing among the trees 
with her little sash of red. She belongs here, Alan.” 

“I know it,” I muttered, “but she did not think so.” 

“I want to tell you, Alan,” went on Meg, disregarding 
the words, “that I saw the two of you here one day such 
as this. I didn’t mean to. I came on you unawares, and 
neither of you saw or heard me. You sat here, on this 


2 96 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

very log. She sat there, closer to the water, and the two 
of you were looking into each other’s faces and talking. 
'Bless their hearts !’ I said to myself. 'There they sit with 
the wall of their own innocence between them, but the 
day will come when the draw of the Universe will drive the 
wall away like the mists of the morning, and the lips will 
meet that ” 

"Why go on with all this?” I interrupted, savagely 
enough. "Can you find no better work to do today than 
come here to twit me?” 

If she had laughed in her tantalizing way I should have 
wanted to throw her into the creek, but she did not. In- 
stead, she looked at me with a great seriousness and con- 
tinued almost as though I had not spoken. 

"After all,” she said, following on with her thought, 
"there’s nothing more sacred in all this world than when 
two who are made for each other meet so, — nor nothing 
more tragic than when two become bound together who 
never should have crossed the same threshold, and that hap- 
pens sometimes, too.” 

After that she seemed to become conscious of what I 
had said, for a smile passed over her face, and so great a 
tenderness came into her eyes as I have seldom seen. 

"And why should I not come to you, machree,” she said, 
using my mother’s own term of endearment, "for, boy, take 
this from me, some day what I have said will come to pass. 
Some day you two will meet again in this place. — It is 
written,” and she laughed, lightly but not mockingly. 

I was not sure that I wanted my heart-history thus dis- 
cussed, and yet the woman fascinated me, so that I could 
not leave off. 

"But how can that be, Meg?” I said. "Don’t you 
know ” 

"Yes. I know everything about Barry,” she replied, 
quickly, "and I know, too, that one day she will come back 
to you in these woods.” 

"But how do you know?” I insisted. "Have you heard 
from her?” 


VISITOR IN GOLDEN-WINGED WOODS 297 

“Perhaps I have, perhaps I haven’t,” she replied, bring- 
ing her air of levity back to her. “Can’t you take me for 
the diviner that I may be, Alan ?-*-Or would you if I wore 
my hat in a peak?” 

After that she turned to me very suddenly, and began 
searching my face, evidently considering what she should 
say. 

“Don’t ask me how or why I know,” she said presently, 
“but let me tell you this, that Barry is discovering that her 
marriage was no true marriage. She is learning what I 
learned long ago, that it takes more than a few words ut- 
tered by a parson to join two souls. She is learning that 
it takes more than a strange ceremony in a forest, as the 
dusk falls, to join two souls. She is learning that true 
marriage does not come of the infatuation of a day, or a 
month, or a year, yet, moreover, that there is a soul’s union 
that transcends space, and time, and is unto Eternity itself. 
Those who are so united know ; no one can tell them. 
— And,” breaking into a laugh that had something of bitter- 
ness in it, “ — those who have not been so united, but have 
been bound together by a foolish attraction and the words 
of a parson, also know; no one can tell them. Of course, 
the parson isn’t to blame. But, Alan, Nature sometimes 
plays strange pranks with us mortals.” 

“And yet ” I began. 

She caught me up. 

“I know,” she said. “You want to tell me that the law 
is as unalterable as the laws of the Medes and Persians. — 
Perhaps it is well that it is so. I don’t pretend to arbitrate 
for such a mottled and tangled world. — But, Alan, I just 
want to leave this one word with you, — Wait. It’s a sore 
word for hot-headed Youth, I know. — But, wait. What is 
coming to you will come to you.” 

It seemed to me that her insight was borne upon me. 
As in a flash of light it came to me that she knew whereof 
she spoke, and for a moment the forest drifted away from 
me to give way to a land of dream. Then I came to myself 
again and saw her sitting there, very quietly,— Old Meg, 


29B THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

with her brown face, and her blue-black hair, and her rusty 
black shawl lying on the green moss beside her. 

“I just wanted to tell you this,” she said, presently. “I 
have knozm your loneliness , Alan. You are one of the 
world’s constant ones, and few enough they are, and fewest 
of all among men. — Now,” arising and taking up her stick 
and shawl, “I must go, machree, and I hope I’ve put a more 
golden edge on the sunlight for you this day.” 

In a burst of gratitude I took her brown hand and pressed 
the warmth of my heart into it. 

“No, don’t come,” she said. “I don’t want you. Sit 
down and go on with your writing.” 

— And so I watched her as she went off through the 
woods, still carrying her broad hat, with Blucher chival- 
rously trotting along at her side. — A strange weird woman, 
— one of the many who have come to this land bearing with 
them a history that will never be told. 

And then I sat down and went over every word that she 
had said. What did she mean by “the strange ceremony 
in the forest as the dusk fell?” Did she speak, then, of 
Barry? — I can see nothing, understand nothing. 

Nevertheless, Old Meg has left me in a fever of anticipa- 
tion and bewildered happiness. I must wait — but while 
hope shines I can wait. In the meantime I shall say nothing 
of all this — not even to my mother. The secret shall be 
between me and the mysterious lame woman who lives 
among her looms in the little house at the outermost fringe 
of the Corners. 


CHAPTER XXXIV, 


STARTLING TIDINGS 

O NCE more I am sitting by the waterfall in the Golden- 
Winged Woods. Indeed, the spot has come to be my 
sanctuary, so that it is not strange that I should bring my 
Journal here to write in it. 

Through the canopy of thick green of the mid-autumn, a 
bough reaches out, here and there in flaming red, and be- 
yond the rivulet there is a maple that has turned to pale 
gold. Closer to the floor of the forest the berries of the 
papoose-root are becoming misted with blue, and the drops 
of the bittersweet are turned to coral. 

But it is not of this I would write today, for the wonder- 
ful thing has happened for me. 

It was when we were in the very thick of the harvest, 
when the wheat was standing heavy about my father and 
me, with just a few bays cut into it with the sickle. 

“It’s a fine crop,” said my father, standing to whet his 
blade. “We must hurry with it, for the oats are beginning 
to whiten.” 

“Yes, we mustn’t lose an ear of it if we can avoid it,” I 
said. “One can’t trust to the weather these days. There 
were sun-dogs last night.” 

With that I stood up to straighten my back for a moment, 
and saw Tom Thomson making way to us, with his horse 
tied at the road. He had gone down to the Comers two 
or more hours since. 

“It’s a letter,” he shouted, waving a bit of white above 
his head; and when he came near he tossed itrto me and 
stopped to talk with father. 

Carelessly I broke open the seal, not recognizing the 

299 


3 oo THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

handwriting of the address; then the throb of a great and 
joyous surprise, albeit mingled with anxiety, came to me. 

The note was from none other than Red Jock’s Eliza- 
beth! 

“Will you come as soon as you can to Toronto?” it said. 
“Barry is here, ill in bed.” 

Tom was already taking his departure, and I handed the 
note to my father. 

“It’s too bad I have to leave just now,” I said. “There’s 
less help since the Rebellion.” 

“You’ll not let that worry you,” he replied. “The lassie’s 
more ill than it says, I doubt, or Mistress McPherson 
wouldn’t have sent for you. — Don’t worry; I’ll find some- 
one from the Village to keep on with the harvest.” — My 
father was game, as he always is. 

And so I lost no time in getting Billy and starting off on 
the journey. 

“She came here a week syne,” said Elizabeth, as she 
ushered me into the little living-room. “The Doctor says 
she’ll be all right, wi’ care. She didn’t ask me to send for 
you, but I well know she’s fair sore for the sight of a kent 
face. I’ve not told her you were expected. We’ll just 
pretend ye dropped in. It’ll do her more good, I’m think- 
ing, than all the doctor’s bottles. — Now I’ll go and tell her 
you’re here.” 

Hitherto I had scarcely given a thought to Selwyn, but 
had been all taken up with the anxiety about reaching my 
girl, but now — probably because I had learned that Barry 
was not yet at death’s door — he came vividly enough to me. 

Perhaps it was that that made me stand quite still for 
a moment when I had entered the little room, — a question 
from the depths of me that demanded had I the right? 
Or perhaps it was only a dazedness that came of seeing 
that little wan face on the pillow. . . . The afternoon sun 
was just beginning to creep along the bed, and the reflection 
of it from the white counterpane lighted up with a glow 
the two spots of red burning on my dear’s cheeks, and the 


STARTLING TIDINGS 


301 

fires of fever blazing in her dark eyes, and all the sweetness 
of her from the ebon black of her hair to the point of her 
little chin. 

At all events there I stood, and we looked into each other’s 
faces, and then, at last, her hand moved a little towards me 
and a smile came into her eyes. 

"Barry!” 

"Alan !” 

I sat down beside her and held her little hot hand, and 
after a while she began to talk. 

"You mustn’t think I’ve been — wicked, Alan,” she said. 
"It was all a mistake. — There were so many mistakes. But 
that’s all past. Of .course, Elizabeth has told you.” 

Elizabeth had not told me — she had thought of nothing 
but hurrying me to Barry — but I inclined my head in assent, 
fearing to worry her with too much explaining. 

"It seems years and years,” she continued, satisfied that 
I understood, "and England seemed so — so foreign, some- 
how. It’s a beautiful country, but I’m glad to be home 
again, Alan. Now I know that it’s not my country — over 
there.” 

"No ; it’s not your country,” I repeated lamely, trying to 
get hold of the threads. 

"I’ll never leave the woods again, Alan,” she went on, 
smiling. "There’ll be no need for me to go back to those 
big cities again. Little Toronto is so different. — Oh, I 
see them, waking sometimes, and sleeping always, — the 
houses and houses, and the hurrying people and traffic, and 
no one caring.” . 

"But you’ll never have to go there again,” I repeated. 

"No need at all,” she said, after me. "Two graves need 
not call one, need they? — Not even a little, little grave?” 

"No, no,” I echoed, startled. And yet I need not have 
been startled. — When I looked back at her her eyes were 
misty with tears, but she did not weep. Barry seldom wept. 

"A grave does not keep a soul near it, does it, Alan?” 
she asked, looking at me piteously. 


302 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“No; oh, no,” I said, wishing I understood all these mys- 
teries that I might explain to her. 

She gave the little, quick nod that I know so well. 

“I know it,” she said. “Long ago I thought that out for 
myself.” 

Again she relapsed into silence, looking away towards the 
window, and picking with her fingers, in the way that sick 
people sometimes do, along the ridge of sunshine on the 
counterpane, while the glow deepened and brightened on 
her face, glorifying it. 

What was the whole story? Was Selwyn dead? And 
what of the “little, little grave”? What was it that had 
been “all a mistake”? — Her marriage? 

After a while she turned her face towards me and smiled, 
and when I would have left her, fearing that more talk 
might increase her feverishness, she laid her hand on mine 
and held me. 

“It's so good to be back, Alan,” she said; and then she 
asked about my mother and all, and was interested to hear 
the part our neighborhood had taken in the Rebellion. — I 
kept talking more than I wished, knowing that it was easier 
for her to listen than to talk. 

Afterwards, when she had fallen asleep and Elizabeth 
and I were seated in the living-room, in the very chairs in 
which Barry and I had sat upon that night of the ball, I 
heard the whole story, or, at least, as much of it as Eliza- 
beth knew ; and the very listening to it made my blood boil 
with indignation against — the dead. 

“She had a very bad time, poor lamb!” said Elizabeth. 
“But don’t you ever say a word against Selwyn. She knows 
now that he was never the one for her. Yet, well it’s queer, 
Mister Alan, how one human being can bewitch another so 
it seems ’tis all love that’s doing it. She doesna blame her- 
self — I’m glad o’ that. And she aye says there was much 
that was lovable about him. But there’ll be no hurt in 
her heart soon, poor lassie, — just a faraway sadness, maybe, 
like a sad song one heard long ago. She’s no bitter at all, 
poor lassie, but so sweet and gentle as never was.” 


STARTLING TIDINGS 


303 

Little by little the story was unfolded, in Elizabeth’s 
gentle voice, with her pretty speech, all interwoven with 
the Scots words here and there. 

Selwyn had left her in New York, with a purse of 
money, making excuse that he must go to England for 
a few weeks. Then his letters failed to come. ... A day 
came when, for the sake of the child that was to be, she 
followed him, and found him in his fine country-home. He 
had advised her to come back to Canada, telling her that 
her marriage could not count, and had offered her money. 
(Elizabeth was not very clear about that.) — There was 
another woman there, she said, a very great beauty whom 
he had married; Barry had met her just inside the gate. 
. . . Then the babe had come, and had died. — Someone 
had been very kind to her. . . . And when she was able 
she had sailed for home. It had been a weary voyage. 
Only a fortnight afterwards she had learned from an Eng- 
lish paper that Selwyn had been killed during a foxhunt. 

. That was all, but between the lines what bitter tragedy! 
I strode the floor as I thought of that frail child buffeting 
her way about, “among the houses and houses,” homeless 
and suffering. — And then I remembered a day many moons 
past, and I saw my dear one sitting amidst the shades of the 
forest, her body swaying to and fro, while her voice, so 
low that almost it was one with the murmuring of the 
leaves, sang the plaint of the O jib way girl: 

Moo goo shah , ween e goo , 

Ke bisk quah, bem ah de, 

Che wah nain, ne mah de 
We yd, yd hah ha ! 

We yd, yd hah hd!” 

— “He will not sigh for her long; as soon as he is out of 
sight he will forget her” 

Surely, that day, the burden of the days to come had 
been upon her. 

I sat down again, and a question was on my tongue* but 


3 04 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

I did not utter it. In a moment Elizabeth answered with- 
out bidding. 

“I don’t know who married them,” she said, “but I doubt 
it was some sort of Nonconformist that her husband didna. 
really recognize. — But for her ’twas all right, poor lassie.” 

“Well, Elizabeth,” I said, at last, “we’ll hope the sadness 
is all over for her — and the hardship. If only I knew — but, 
you know, she drove me away over and over, — ever so 
gently, Elizabeth, you know that, but ever so decidedly, 
too.” 

“As to that I canna say,” replied Elizabeth, “but remem- 
ber, Mister Alan, Taint heart never won fair lady.’ ” 

It was impossible, because of the harvest, for me to stay 
more than a few days, which I spent right royally at Uncle 
Joe’s, going over to Elizabeth’s every afternoon and evening: 
but before I left the doubt was all cleared away. 

Barry had seemed more than ever kind and tender that 
day. I do not remember just how it came, but I found 
myself telling her once more how I had hoped for so long, 
and how she had ever and ever pushed me away. Perhaps 
I should not have permitted myself to speak so then, but it 
seemed to come of itself, quite naturally. 

At first Barry lay there quite still, her eyes fixed on a 
swaying vine at the window, then she began to speak, very 
slowly and quietly, telling a story that appeared, for a 
time, utterly foreign to the thing that I hoped she would 
say. 

“I want to tell you something, Alan,” she began. “You 
will remember what you always called the ‘Indian streak’ in 
me? — Well, it is there, Alan. I have often wondered 
whether there is a story about me in the little porcupine- 
quilled moccasin. You remember it? — I have never let it 
go from me, Alan, — that nor the silhouette. Some day, 
perhaps, I shall know.” 

She paused, and I waited, looking at her wonderful, 
speaking face, with its traces of anguish, framed in by the 
blackness of her hair on the white pillow. 


STARTLING TIDINGS 


305 

“Do you remember the Indian boy — that night in the 
forest, when you camped by the spring?” she asked, after 
a moment. 

“Yes,” I said. “Afterwards I found out he was you, 
Barry.” 

“You did?” — raising her eyebrows in surprise. “I 
thought I loved — him, then, Alan. I lived, moved, breathed, 
worked, only for him. Then he did not know — about me, 
I mean. He thought I was just Nahneetis, the Indian lad. 
... It was just after that that he found out. I think 
perhaps your coming — the association — brought it to him. 
One day he remembered, suddenly, and then — everything 
seemed to happen. He wanted me to marry him.” 

“Yes,” I said. — “Barry, don’t tell me this now if it is 
too much for you.” 

“But I want to tell you,” she replied. — “Alan, I wonder 
if you will understand. Remember, my whole soul seemed 
to be in his keeping. He was an angel of goodness in my 
sight. — And he seemed to know all the things that appealed 
to me. One day I told him about an Indian wedding. I 
had seen it when I went off to Wabadick’s, to buy the clothes 
from Joe. — I wore them, you know, and made my face 
brown with juice from the butternut husks. — Shall I tell 
you? . . . We were sitting in front of the wigwams by 
the river — Wabadick, and his squaw, and Joe and the little 
ones, — when a canoe passed with a young squaw and a 
young Indian in it, and she was paddling the canoe. They 
neither looked at us nor spoke, and when they had gone out 
of sight Wabadick said they were being married. That 
was their ceremony — going to their home with the squaw 
paddling the canoe. Wabadick and his squaw had been 
married that way too. Before that there had been this 
pledge : he had gone to her, placing two fingers before her 
face, bringing them together to look like one. She had 
smiled, which meant ‘y es -’ After that there had been a 
feast, perhaps, and now they were completing the ceremony 
by this silent voyage in the dusk, to their wigwam down by 
the Great Rock of the Rushing Water. They would be 


30 6 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

true to each other, Wabadick told me, in his own way. . . . 
Alan, perhaps I was over romantic, although it seemed to 
me, rather, some urge in me that I cannot explain, — but I 
wish I could tell you how that simple uniting for life ap- 
pealed to me. It seemed that the very hush of the evening 
along the banks was a prayer, and the ripple of the water a 
wedding-hymn, and that the Great Munedoo smiled ap- 
proval in the smiling of the sunset.” 

Again she paused, and what could I do but wait? 

“I wonder if you can understand, Alan,” she continued, 
pleadingly. “When Howard knew that I was not Nah- 
neetis, he told me that this ceremony was just as sacred as 
any solemnized by any parson. — I believed him as I would 
have believed an angel from heaven, Alan. — We — we were 
married just like that. To me it was all wholly sacred 
and right. I never dreamed he could think it otherwise 
until I went to England. He told me there that our mar- 
riage could not be recognized as legal. He had married 
another woman, in the big cathedral. She was wonderfully 
beautiful, Alan. No wonder he wanted to send me back to 
the forests.” 

“You poor child!” I muttered. “You poor, poor child!” 

“That was a dreadful time, Alan,” she went on, her 
voice dropping almost to a whisper. “For a few days I 
thought I should die, and wished it. But to me our mar- 
riage still held fast, Alan. As the days and weeks went 
on I realized that my love for him had been — fascination — 
not true love. Yet there had been the solemnizing of our 
vows in the forest, and I could not feel myself free until 
I heard he was — dead.” 

She stopped abruptly, then turned to me. “Now,” she 
said, “you know. Do you think me very wicked, Alan ?” 

“I understand you, Barry,” was all I could say, over and 
over. “Nothing matters. — I understand you, Barry.” 

For long minutes she looked at me, while I pressed her 
hot hands between mine, then suddenly she raised herself 
from the pillow. There was a little bundle of splints by 


STARTLING TIDINGS 307 

the grate, which Elizabeth had left there for helping the 
fire, and she asked for them. 

I gave them to her, wondering what she meant to do, 
and at once she began to place them on the counterpane, 
beginning as far down as she could reach. 

In a moment I saw that she was trying to build, from 
me to her, — a little pateran. 

“Barry ! Barry !” I said, and I took her in my arms, and 
poured the loving words into her ears, which I had been 
crowding back because of fear of her illness. I fear that 
everything was forgotten then, but the great light had come 
with knowing that she cared for me. 

Perhaps we talked over-long that evening, but it brought 
no harm to her, and when I called next morning — it was 
the day on which I was to leave the city — she greeted me 
very brightly. 

“I want to be married before you leave, Alan/’ she said. 

“And then I’ll hurry away to get things fixed up at 
‘Riverdale,’ ” I added. 

So it was that our wedding took place at the bedside, with 
Elizabeth’s minister officiating, and no witnesses there but 
Elizabeth and Nora. — A sweet sacred ceremony it was, with 
festivity enough, too, for Nora had come with her arms 
filled with flowers, and Elizabeth had provided a wedding 
breakfast dainty enough for a Queen. — As for me, my 
only contribution more than the plain gold ring was the 
little vine of squawberry that my girl wore in her hair. I 
had ridden far out the old Humber trail before I found it — 
far beyond the curiously bent old tree past which Hank and 
I had run that wild, sad day in December. 

Immediately after the breakfast, which was spread at 
the bedside also, I left for home, hoping to cover the jour- 
ney as far as the first stopping-place before midnight. 
They stood in the street to see me off, — Nora and Elizabeth, 
aye and Uncle Joe and the rest of the family, too, who had 
come up in the old family coach, — but my last look was up 
to the window of my girl’s room, on which the sinking sun 


308 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

shone in a glare of gold. It was, I knew, glorifying her 
happy face. 

And so I on home, where once again I found the lads 
helping in with the harvest, having given a day’s work to 
catch up with it. But this time it was not The Schoolmaster 
and Hank and Dickie, but Tom Thomson and Ned Burns 
and Mickey Feeley. 

“Yes, we thought we might as well give a hand,” said 
Tom, looking off to the woods and trying to stifle my thanks 
with an embarrassed indifference. “We was pretty well 
through with our own, ye see.” 

But Mickey was more self-congratulatory. “Shure, an’ 
it’s not an Irishman ’ll be behindhand whin there’s a girl 
in the wind,” said he. “An’ it’s hopin’ ye’d hev’ her home 
wid ye, we’ve been.” 

Since then I have been very busy, both with the work at 
home and at “Riverdale,” trying to make it fit for my Wild 
Rose Woman, — for the place was in sad need of repair and 
the touch of Big Bill none too artistic. 

But the days have been filled with sunshine, and as often 
as may be there has come a letter that has made that day, 
as Old Meg said, “still more golden.” 

My mother, however, says we must not wait for the com- 
pletion of the improvements at Riverdale, but that just as 
soon as Barry is able for the journey we must bring her 
here; and so I await the momentous letter that will name 
the day. 

Before closing, I may add that Elizabeth has heard from 
Red Jock. He is roaming about through the border towns 
and has gone over completely to the Republicans, allying 
himself still with Mackenzie, who is even yet doing his 
utmost to stir up such measures as may lead to the sub- 
version of the Government in this country, and, no doubt, 
its inclusion among the States of the Union. The School- 
master, Hank writes, is doing likewise, and often speaks at 
the meetings, with such effect that he is cheered to the 
•echo. Of course Hank is again with The Schoolmaster, 


STARTLING TIDINGS 


309 

and sometimes I fear for them both, the latest news of 
them being that they have joined themselves to one of the 
“Hunters’ Lodges,” of which we hear strange tales, and 
whose existence, we may conclude, bodes no peaceful future 
for Canada. 

These things, I confess, are very perturbing, and most 
of all to those of us who, while still holding to Reform 
principles, are averse to separation from the Empire. . . . 
Indeed, we have now greater reason than ever, since the 
Rebellion, to hope that, within a reasonable time, our wrongs 
shall be righted, for our rebellion has failed only in seem- 
ing. About the end of May, Lord Durham, Britain’s Com- 
missioner, arrived here, and since then he has been laboring 
among us, studying the conditions of the country from 
every angle, and it is hoped that his efforts will not be 
for nothing. 

All this, however, passes for little, it appears, among the 
agitators along the frontier in the United States, who, hav- 
ing set Liberty as their goal — as, indeed, have we all — now 
seem to see but one way in which it can be obtained. 
Knowing The Schoolmaster and Hank as I do, I can well 
see their state of mind, and well do I know the unselfish- 
ness and nobility of their purpose; but often I fear for 
them, and wish they had not taken absolute sides with the 
most radical faction of our party. 

Already during the year there have occurred some raids, 
with casualties, — of which I have not heretofore written in 
these pages — along the southwestern borders of this 
Province, at Amherstburg and Pelee Island ; and the things 
that have there taken place may occur again, at any time, 
and at any place along our frontier. 

Truly we live from day to day, not knowing what an 
hour may bring forth. 


CHAPTER XXXV] 


THE JOURNEY 

T HE letter came about a week after my last writing: 

“I think I am ready for the journey, Alan, if you 
can take me on pillows, very slowly, in a wagon. I want 
to see the Golden-Winged Woods before the snow falls.” 

So it was that I set off with the only spring-wagon in 
the neighborhood, Tom Thomson’s. 

Indeed the whole Settlement was aroused over my going, 
and everyone wanted to contribute something. Tom pro- 
vided, besides the wagon and a horse to go with Billy, a 
little tent that has often stood him in good stead in trips 
through the forest. My mother had fixed up a feather bed 
to go under it, and at the last moment Mistress Jones came 
bustling along with stone jugs “fer her feet,” to be filled 
with hot water in case it should turn cold. — And so I set 
off very fully equipped. 

. . . But when we were about ready to leave the city, 
Uncle Joe arrived with his family coach, and came more 
than half of the way home with us, insisting that I ride in 
the coach with Barry while he followed behind in the wagor^ 
“It’ll be a change for her to move from the one to the 
other,” he explained. “She’ll not be so tired.” 

Thus it was that we traveled off in fine style, with oui 
private physician, and often enough we looked back, to 
wave a hand to him or call to him, as he followed, sitting 
very erectly on the seat, with his hat off and the sun shining 
on his bald head, happy as a robin in April, and smiling 
at us as he touched Billy and Nell along to keep up with his 
own more spirited bays in our coach. 

“Tear an’ ages!” he would exclaim, rattling up as we 
310 


THE JOURNEY 31 1 

waited. “How do you expect an old fellow like me to keep 
up with that gait ? I’ll warrant you weren’t so spry in the 
courting days.” 

Before we separated, somewhere past the Half-way 
House, he let me first build a bed of boughs — deep and 
springy, and odorous — in the bottom of the wagon, and 
then he arranged the feather bed on that and I put the 
little tent over it and laid my girl down, propped up with 
pillows so that she might miss nothing of the scenes for 
which she had longed as we passed by. 

“It’s the darling girl she is !” he said, kissing her roundly 
on the mouth, “and it’s the lucky dog you are, Alan, ye 
spalpeen ! Well, give my love to your mother and father. — 
Nora and I’ll be down at New Year’s, if we have to come on 
snow-shoes.” 

At the Village the Doctor and his wife and daughter — 
and some of the others, too — came out to bid us welcome; 
but at the Corners not a soul appeared, except Hank’s 
father, who came bustling out of his store with his quiet 
smile. 

“Where’s everybody ?” I asked, somewhat puzzled. “The 
place seems to be deserted.” 

“Why, they’re all off on a picnic,” he replied. 

But when we had gone up the road a bit, there were they 
all — all that were left of them. They came out from the 
trees, and stood in the road, and waved their hands to us. 

“Why, there are Jimmy and Hannah!” I exclaimed, as 
we drew nearer. 

For there the two dear souls were, smiling from ear to 
ear; and there were father and mother, and Tom Thomson 
and his wife, and Mistress Jones and her “toppler,” and 
Dimple, and Ned Burns, and Mickey Feeley, and all the 
other boys and girls, big and little, of the whole neighbor- 
hood. ... At the very last moment someone sprang out 
from the undergrowth, and there was Dicky boy himself, 
proudly beamed upon by his mother, and anxious to have 
a talk with me to tell me all the “noos.” 


312 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

“How is Meg?” asked Barry, when she could get in a 
word between the laughing and the chaffing. 

“Oh, she’s fine,” volunteered Mistress Jones. “She’s up 
at the house waitin’. The, supper’s all spread out o’ doors, 
an’ someone had to stay to keep the cat offi an’ shoo the 
hens out o’ the yard. — We’re jist goin’ to eat an’ run, Barry. 
We know ye’ll be wantin’ to rest, darlin’, but we couldn’t 
let the day go by without celebratin’ a little. It isn’t every 
day a bride comes to us from furrin parts. We’ve been 
sittin’ on pins an’ needles fer fear it ’ud rain, but ye’d think 
the weather had been made on purpose.” 

“And how is it that you’re here, Jimmy?” I asked. 

“I got a chanst o’ buyin’ a bit o’ land behind the tavern,” 
he explained* “an’ we’re goin’ to turn the tavern into a 
dwellin’ house. Ye see I made good money over’n the 
States, an’ got a start, enough to pay down a payment or 
two, yes, siree ! — No goin’ back behind The Block any more 
fer Hannah ! — Now then, boys !” turning away from us and 
holding up his hand to the others, exactly as I have seen 
him do many a time at a “raising” before he began to yell 
“Yo-Heave !” 

But with that he himself picked up my mother as if she 
had been a bird, and placed her, laughing at his daring, be- 
side Barry, while the lads set upon the horses and took 
them out of the wagon, and my father led them offi. Then 
the lads fell along on each side of the tongue and behind 
the wagon, and so pulled and pushed us the rest of the way 
home, in the midst of such laughing and halloing as had 
seldom before been heard along the old road. 

I looked at Barry, and she was smiling through tears. 
“How dear they are ! How very dear they are !” she said. 

— And so we turned in at the gate, and went on to the 
house, where, indeed, was Old Meg standing guard over 
the tables laid out in gala array in the evening sunshine be- 
fore the door, with bright autumn leaves festooned about 
and above them, and great bunches of Michaelmas daisies 
and purple wild grapes in jars along the center. 

It was a gay and glad scene, but even in the midst of it 


THE JOURNEY 313 

the sense of a great blank came to me, for Hank was not 
there, nor The Schoolmaster, nor Red Jock. 

As the dusk came on they all l^ft but Dicky, who waited 
to have a little talk. 

When I had come out of the house after seeing that 
Barry was resting, we sat down on the bench by the door, 
and Dicky handed me a parcel neatly tied in brown paper, 
but it was not to be added to the pile of gifts left on the 
living-room table, he said. 

“It seemed sort o’ sad like to give ye today,” he ex- 
plained, “but the Master told me to give it to ye.” 

Curiously I took off the wrapper, and there was a little 
walnut box, such as the prisoners had been making, and 
about it had been painted, with The Schoolmaster’s own 
painstaking perfection of lettering, these verses : 

“When Lount and Matthews met their doom, 

It seemed that Freedom died; 

But not the sword of Death can stay 
The Powers that onward ride. 

“For Right shall triumph over Wrong; 

The body, only, dies; 

And they who died ere long shall see 
Their shining goal arise.” 

Not very good poetry, perhaps, but filled, to those who 
could read between the lines, with The Schoolmaster’s 
philosophy of life,— that not one effort for liberty or right, 
even though apparently defeated, can be lost, and that the 
soul that strives shall know and be satisfied. 

“He was in the jail in Hamilton when he made it,” said 
Dick, indicating the box. “He got away somehow, an’ made 
a bee-line fer the States. Him an’ Hank’s together again, 
thick as bugs in a rug. I seen them often fer a while, an’ 
they were alwus talkin’ about giftin' Canada’s liberty goin’, 
an’ The Schoolmaster was alwus makin’ speeches. They 
sort o’ fired me up too fer a while, but I guess I got home- 


3i4 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

sick. There jist didn’t seem anything worth while but the 
old swimmin’ hole; an’ so I cut it an’ run, an’ here I am.” 

“Do you think there’ll be a real invasion of Canada, 
Dick?” I asked. 

“The Lord only knows,” he replied. 

• •••••• 

Three days have passed since then, and very gently my 
mother is nursing my girl back to strength there in the 
little “spare room,” which has been given over to her, mak- 
ing her sleep early and late and feeding her on the best of 
the land, which, indeed, is easy enough to do, for every 
d*iy someone comes with some tid-bit, — a speckled trout 
from the creek, or a partridge cooked to a turn on a spit, 
or a mug of jelly of the wild grape or cranberry. 

This evening Barry sat for the space of two hours by 
the fireplace, with mother and father as proud to see her 
there as was I. Very soon, if there come a fine day, I must 
carry her to the Golden- Winged Woods. 


CHAPTER XXXVI 


THE HOME GOING 

CO we are here together, just as Old Meg said we should 
be,” I remarked to Barry, looking beyond her, as she 
sat on a rug near me, to the little waterfall, which was now 
brawling merrily because of the fall increase in flood ; and 
then I told her the story of the old weaver’s visit to me at 
this spot. 

“After all, her prophecy is easily explained,” returned 
Barry. “She was the only one I wrote to.” 

“I suspected as much,” I said. 

Barry settled herself back against the mossy log and 
crossed her little feet, which she had chosen this day to 
encase in moccasins embroidered with stained quills of the 
porcupine. 

I drew my mother’s Paisley shawl about her and stooped 
from my perch on the log to twine a bit of green vine 
about her head. “There,” I said. “Now you are Poca- 
hontas again.” 

She smiled, but her thoughts were still with Old Meg. 

“I think I wrote to her,” she continued, “in the hope of 
hearing something about you, Alan, although I wouldn’t let 
myself think that, then. Now I know I was beginning to 
discover what you had been to me from the first, dear. 
You had always been my haven and my rest. I was very 
homesick when I wrote to Meg. Oh, Alan, you don’t know ! 
I just told her everything.” 

“Meg knows how to hold her tongue,” I said. 

“I know that,” replied Barry. “She’s really superior to — 
to many women, in spite of her oddness.” 

“Yes,” I assented. “What strange people drift to this 
new country, Barry.” 


3i5 


316 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

She looked up at me and smiled. 

‘‘And what a beautiful country it is!” she said, slipping 
her hand into mine. 

And then together we looked all about, and listened to 
the sound of nuts dropping and squirrels leaping from 
branch to branch. Everywhere the trees were bare save 
for a few shreds of yellow and red hanging like banners 
among the branches, and, here and there, the deep, dark 
green of the pines ; but the ground below was covered with 
a rustling carpet of golden and crimson leaves, which had 
settled about the clumps of green fern and “burning bush” 
all drooping with scarlet berries. 

“Yes, it’s beautiful,” she repeated. “Alan, I’ve quite lost 
all my longing for palaces and mirrored walls and silken 
dresses. Do you remember?” 

“I remember.” 

“What a child I was !” she laughed, snapping a little 
twig between her shapely fingers. Then, after a moment, 
“We’ll never leave these woods, shall we, unless we go up 
to visit Elizabeth, and Nora, and Uncle Joe and the rest. 
I love them all.” 

“And they love you,” I added. “Barry, when do you 
think you’ll be able to go to Riverdale?” 

“Why, very soon, I hope,” she replied. “I want to go 
before the ice forms on the river.” 

“But we can go in the spring wagon,” I said, looking 
down at her, “or in the sleigh, if the snow’s here then.” 

“No,” she said, quite determinedly, “I want to go by the 
river. You’re sure you’ll buy Hank’s canoe, Alan?” 

“Cross my heart,” I said, willing to humor her whim. 

For a little she said nothing, but kept gazing into the 
waterfall, and then she crept towards me and I slipped down 
on the rug beside her and took her in my arms. 

“Riverdale is down the river, Alan?” she remarked, with 
inquiry in her soft voice, although she must have remem- 
bered quite well. 

“Yes, down the river.” 


THE HOME GOING 317 

“I could paddle along it quite well, then, even if I weren’t 
very strong,” she continued. 

“Yes, at this time of the year it would carry the canoe 
almost of itself,” I said. 

And then I stopped, wondering, and drew her very close 
to me, and knew that the thought-force of a hundred 
generations was working through her. 

“You want to paddle me home, Barry?” I said, very close 
to the little pink shell of her ear. 

“Yes,” she whispered, then looked into my eyes with all 
the sweet frankness of her and smiled. 

Dear child, I knew then that to her the real day of our 
marriage must be sanctified by this ceremony of the tribe. 
Only thus, to her, could the Great Munedoo come, placing 
the seal of a sacred rite on our union. 

“I’m very foolish, Alan,” she said, presently, with a little 
laugh of apology. “I can’t explain this wish, but it is there.” 

“It shall be as you wish, Barry,” I replied. “It will be a 
very sweet home-going.” 

And then, almost as the last words left my lips, there 
warbled, from the top of a tree near us, a faint and sleepy, 
yet clear, call. 



“The white-throat !” we exclaimed simultaneously, almost 
startled, and then we looked at each other and smiled. 

“He’s on his way south,” I said. 

“And he seems very tired,” she added. 

“But he’ll come next spring.” 

“Yes, we’ll be here together again with the white-throats,” 
she said. 

I am writing this in my little room beneath the roof — 
perhaps I shall never write in it again, but sometimes I 
shall come into it, for the two homes will be almost one. 


3 1 8 THE FORGING OF THE PIKES 

Just a few days ago Barry and I sat by the waterfall. In 
just a few moments, we shall set out for Riverdale. 
The last load has been taken, Barry is tying on her bonnet 
downstairs. 

Another day has almost passed. Outside great snow- 
flakes are falling. It turned cold in the night. 

Barry is lying asleep on the couch that I made, with so 
much loving thought of her; — like a little child she drops 
asleep anywhere and at any time, but it is bringing back to 
her, little by little, the strength of the old Barry, — my 
Oogenebahgooquay, my tired Rose Woman — whose spring- 
ing step used to carry her through the Golden-Winged 
Woods. . . . Near us the fireplace is filled with blazing 
logs, and on the drawn-out coals the kettle is beginning to 
sing. . . . Looking out of the window, with its blue and 
white curtains drawn back so far that they do not cover it 
at all, I can see the river. It is very gray and leaden this 
evening, and the great white snowflakes, coming down like 
flowers, disappear instantly when they fall upon it. 

Last night it was all crimson, and amber, and gold — for, 
as Mistress Jones says, “the weather has held off” wonder- 
fully. 

They came with us as far as the river — mother and 
father — the four of us riding in the spring-wagon, then, 
when we had come to the little cove where the canoe lay, 
on the bank, they kissed Barry and went back. 

We watched them until they had gone over the hill, and 
the last rattle of the wagon had died away on the still eve- 
ning air. Then Barry and I were folded in each other’s 
arms. 

In a moment or so, I pushed the canoe down into the 
water. When I turned to her there she stood, in her dress 
of buckskin color, with the red sash about her waist, and 
a little sprig of squawberry in her hair, which hung! 
straight about her shoulders. On her feet were the little 
moccasins embroidered with porcupine quills. Smiling, 
she stood, and the light of the sunset shone on her white 


THE HOME GOING 319 

face and into the depths of her great dark eyes. But her 
lips were very red, and into her cheeks a glow had come 
that was not altogether of returning health. 

Beside her, on the bank, were her bonnet and the long 
cloak she had worn. 

Almost breathless I stood, but when I would have spoken 
she placed her fingers on my lips. 

“Come !” she said, and stepped into the canoe. 

Silently I followed her and took my place, pushing my 
hand against a spur of root to send the light craft out 
towards the current. 

Already she was kneeling in her place, beginning to wield 
the paddle, and so, with her body swaying with the stroke, 
and her long hair blowing on the light breeze, we passed 
out upon the water, &11 checkered with the sunset and the 
deep shade of the trees along the shore. 

Thus they went their way to the Wigwam in the Penah- 
queewene Keezis, the moon of the falling leaf, and she 
paddled the canoe . 


The End 


















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• • • ■•"■■■ouii ram unve 

Cranberry Twp., p A 16066 

(412)779-2111 


MAR 26 1920 



